The Russian authorities hand out punishments and rewards equally selectively. For Khodorkovsky the end result is plain: He’s been stripped of his company, exiled to a Chita-region prison-colony and put to work in a sewing workshop at a salary of 30 rubles a month. Meanwhile Roman Abramovich has bought ‘Chelsea’, won top place in the Russian billionaires’ list and made $13 billion out of Sibneft. Khodorkovsky and Abramovich are, of course, very different people, a fact which explains their different fates. But the contrast between their two current positions says a great deal about contemporary Russia. How the stick of a show trial has worked can be read all over our web-site. How the carrot that came before it has panned out can be read below.