Amnesty is an important event in any society’s life, and the latest presidential pardon in Russia was of great interest. One of the released under a new amnesty law was the richest oppositional prisoner, Mikhail Khodorkovsky. The information about the release of the former Russian oligarch was the major one. Analysts all over the world provided their forecasts. The majority of experts consider that Putin’s decision will be favourable for the investment climate in Russia and the country’s image on the whole. Now there are prerequisites for an idea that foreign investors would reconsider their projects on the territory of the Russian Federation; until that, many entrepreneurs feared to start business in the country where “the regime and the authority are above the law”. The news has had a positive effect on the major indices, MICEX and RTS added 0.75% and 0.51% respectively. Before the Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, the Russian government is trying its best to redeem the country’s image. Many delegations either refuse visiting Sochi or regard it as a formality. The authorities were forced to release the participants of a scandalous punk moleben, Greenpeace group taking part in the action in the Prirazlomnoye field and participants of the Bolotnaya Square case. The only reason it was done for is proving the other countries that this country has a democratic regime. However, there are fears that afterwards stricter measures will be taken. For example, Sergei Guriev, a Russian economist and a former Morgan Stanley Professor of Economics and a Rector at the New Economic School (NES) in Moscow, considers that it is good news for investment climate and it would be very good if Khodorkovsky would be released. However, at the moment Guriev resides in France and is afraid to return back to Russia. “I have heard enough to realize it is unsafe for me to return,” Guriev said in an interview.
