Core shareholders in the embattled oil giant Yukos threatened on Tuesday to sue a syndicate of Western banks lending money to the gas monopoly Gazprom to enable it to bid for Yukos' main production unit

Core shareholders in the embattled oil giant Yukos threatened on Tuesday to sue a syndicate of Western banks lending money to the gas monopoly Gazprom to enable it to bid for Yukos' main production unit. Tim Osborne, managing director of Group Menatep, the holding for Yukos' principal owners, told AFP that lawsuits could be filed in several countries including the United States, Germany, France and Britain. "Given that everyone knows the Yukos situation, it is our view that the banks will be assisting any purchaser knowing that the purchaser can't obtain good title," Osborne said by telephone from London. "As directors we have an obligation to protect the assets of our company and maintain value for our shareholders. As such we have little choice but to try to recover any damages caused from those people that knowingly cause it," he added. Gazprom is currently negotiating with a consortium of mainly European banks a loan of €10 billion (R76 billion) to finance a bid for Yuganskneftegaz, the crown jewel of Yukos. The consortium is headed by Germany's biggest bank Deutsche Bank and includes other big-name European banks, such as ABN Amro of the Netherlands, BNP Paribas and Calyon of France, German bank Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein and US group JP Morgan, an informed source told AFP last week. The Menatep director also said that Gazprom, if confirmed as the winner of the December 19 auction, would face legal action. Russia plans on Sunday to auction off 76.8 percent of Yuganskneftegaz, which produces more than a million barrels of crude a day for Yukos, to raise money to pay off some of the 26 billion dollars in back taxes the state says are owed by the top Russian oil producer.