Kremlin finds renewed power from oil

Flush with oil and gas wealth, Russia has acquired the economic might to inflict punishing wounds on British interests – if it so wishes.

With the world’s third largest foreign reserves ($405 billion), the country is unrecognisable from the basket case that defaulted in 1998. The economy is growing at 7.7 per cent a year, and the Moscow bourse has just reached the big league with a worth of $1,000 billion (
Telegraph