RUSSIA - Mar 16 - Economic Reformer Survives Bomb Attack.

Anatoly Chubais, one of the architects of Russia's 1990 economic reforms, survives an assassination attempt sending shivers through Moscow's political and business elite. A bomb, reported to have been packed with screws and bolts, exploded between the vehicles in Chubais's two-car convoy on the Minsk highway west of Moscow at 9.30am. Two attackers then sprayed his heavily-armoured BMW with automatic weapons fire. Chubais, who was unhurt, is one of Russia's most influential businessmen, heading Unified Energy System (UES), the state power monopoly that he is attempting to restructure. He is best known for masterminding Russia's post-Communist privatisation programme, and in the mid-1990s was widely seen as the real power behind Boris Yeltsin, the president. However, as Chubais has acknowledged, he became a hate figure for many Russians after his mass privatisations resulted in the country's most lucrative assets being concentrated in the hands of a small group of super-rich oligarchs. The number of assassinations in Moscow has fallen since the gang warfare of the 1990s. But the attempt on Chubais's life, following the murder last July of editor of Russian Forbes magazine Paul Klebnikov, highlights the extent to which violence is still used to settle business and political scores. Chubais, who has recently increased his security, said: I have an idea of who could have taken out a contract on me. Frankly speaking, I recently had reason to suppose something like this could happen". The UES chief said he was on his usual route to work when the attack happened. A window and wheel of his car were damaged, but not enough to prevent it speeding away leaving security guards travelling in an accompanying Mitsubishi Lancer to return fire. Police said they had found a green Saab that they believed was used by the assailants and have launched a manhunt. In an interview with the FT last November, Chubais said he knew at least three murder contracts had been taken out on him. "It was purely political grounds, hatred that I sold out Russia", he said then. People close to Chubais said they believed the attack could be an attempt to destabilise the country's political situation. It is likely to increase the sense of nervousness among Russia's business community, rocked by the Yukos affair and a series of high-profile campaigns against companies by the tax police. Arkady Volsky, president of the Russian union of industrialists and entrepreneurs, said the assassination attempt was an "attack on Russian enterprise". "This is not just an attempt on the life of a high-ranking public servant, but a reminder to all businessmen that showing entrepreneurial initiative in this country is a dangerous thing", he said. Andrei Trapeznikov, a long-time associate of Chubais, said a large number of people had grudges against him, from the "Red" directors whose factories he privatised in the 1990s, to those who opposed his plans for electricity market reform today. Trapeznikov said: The hatred of Chubais didn't weaken all the years that he worked in politics and in business, trying to build a civilised market and a democratic society in Russia".