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Khodorkovsky wife says no hope for husband's acquittal

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The wife of jailed ex-oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky said she has no hope that her husband will be acquitted in the second criminal case against him.

The wife of jailed ex-oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky said she has no hope that her husband will be acquitted in the second criminal case against him.

Moscow's Khamovniki district court is expected to announce the verdict to Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev on Monday. The announcement was originally planned to begin on December 16.

Khodorkovsky and Lebedev have already spent seven years behind bars for tax evasion. They are facing new charges of embezzling 218 million tons of oil from Khodorkovsky's former oil firm Yukos, and laundering over $97.5 million in revenues.

If found guilty, the two men face another seven years in jail. Both defendants have repeatedly maintained their innocence and claimed that the charges against them were politically motivated.

"No. I do not believe it," Inna Khodorkovsky said in the interview with a Snob magazine. "My husband will be in jail until 2012, that's for sure. And after that who knows what will happen? No one," she added.

When asked about the Khodorkovsky case during his question-and-answer session on December 16, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said: "I think that a thief should be in jail."

He added: "Our courts are the most humane in the world."

Inna Khodorkovsky said she was sure that no matter what verdict will be announced, her husband will endure to the end. "Now there is no way he will give up, I tell you," she said.

Speaking on claims that Khodorkovsky might have been involved in the murder of Vladimir Petukhov, the mayor of the city of Nefteyugansk, Inna said she believed that her husband was innocent.

"I know him from inside. He is not that kind of person. He cannot step over corpses. Living with such a person would be unacceptable for me," she said in the interview.

She also ruled out the possibility for her to leave Russia and move to another country. "It is important for me to be here and raise my children here. My husband and I are like this."

MOSCOW, December 26 (RIA Novosti)

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