Putin’s arrival as a political power in 1999 marked a “clear shift of the political and legal landscape,” Deripaska wrote in his defense, and allowed the billionaire to free himself from the grip of organized crime.

Deripaska and Cherney met on March 10, 2001, at the Lanesborough Hotel in London. At the meeting, the billionaire agreed to pay $250 million that he says was his final protection payment, according to his defense, denying Cherney ownership claims in part because Liechtenstein law only enforces agreements “which are clear and free from uncertainty.”

Deripaska settled his suit with Cherney last September, agreeing to pay him $200 million over six years, according to Russian newspaper Vedomosti. Vera Kurochkina, his spokeswoman at Rusal, didn’t respond to requests for comment. Dmitry Radyshevsky, Cherney’s spokesman in Israel, said he declined to comment.

Gibraltar, Cyprus

Roman Abramovich, Russia’s eighth-richest man, used a maze of offshore entities to build and control his $12.9 billion commodities fortune. According to a lawsuit brought against him in London by Boris Berezovsky, Abramovich shuffled assets, including stakes in oil, aluminum, automobile manufacturing and airlines, between holding companies in Gibraltar, Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands.

One asset was a 50 percent stake in OAO Sibneft, the oil company he acquired for $100 million in 1996 and sold to state- controlled Gazprom in 2005 for $13 billion. Berezovsky sued for $6.8 billion, which he said was his rightful share of the business. Abramovich, he said in the suit, had intimidated him into selling it.

Berezovsky lost the case in August, with the judge labeling him “an unimpressive and inherently unreliable witness who regarded truth as a transitory, flexible concept.” Seven months later, the 67-year-old Berezovsky was found dead in his Surrey home near London.

Offshore Vehicles

Through his spokesman, John Mann, Abramovich, 46, declined to elaborate on the legal arguments filed with the court.

The importance of offshore holdings in Russia was emphasized by Steven Theede, former chief executive of Yukos Oil Co., once Russia’s biggest oil producer. He told the Amsterdam Court of First Instance in 2010 that offshore vehicles and international courts were necessary to protect assets because of the government’s “manipulation” of the Russian legal system.