Related: Backgrounder: Major developments in Mikhail Khodorkovsky's case

    MOSCOW, May 31 (Xinhuanet) -- Former Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky was sentenced to nine years in prison Tuesday after being found guilty of fraud and tax evasion, the Interfax news agency reported.

    

Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky was sentenced to nine years in prison on Tuesday after being found guilty of six charges, the Interfax news agency reported. (AFP Photo)

The sentence, which capped 12 days of reading of a voluminous verdict in Khodorkovsky's case, was one year less than the punishment sought by the prosecution, which demanded the maximum 10-year term for Khodorkovsky.

    Khodorkovsky's business partner Platon Lebedev was also sentenced to nine years in prison by Moscow's Meshchansky Court. The court gave a third defendant, Andrei Krainov, a five year suspended sentence.

    Khodorkovsky and the other two defendants can appeal the judgement to a higher court within 10 days, one of the court's judges said.

    Moscow's Meshchansky Court found Khodorkovsky guilty of fraud, corporate tax evasion, embezzlement, causing property damage and ignoring court rulings.

    Khodorkovsky, once Russia's richest man who used to be seen hobnobbing with the likes of Bill Gates at charity events, has been behind the bars for more than a year and he pleaded innocent to all charges against him.

    The company he founded, Yukos, has been all but crushed by a legal onslaught of back taxes and seen its chunks carved up by rival companies.

    Yuganskneftegas, Yukos' main production unit that accounted for more than 60 percent of its oil output, was auctioned off in December and subsequently acquired by state-owned oil company Rosneft.

    Yukos described the sentence for Khodorkovsky as a "gross travesty of justice" in a Tuesday statement.

    The court also ordered Khodorkovsky and Lebedev to pay 17.3 billion rubles (617.9 million US dollars) of back taxes owed by their companies in civil suits filed by the Federal Tax Service.

    In addition, Khodorkovsky was found to have evaded taxes as a private person, which amounted to 54.5 million rubles (1.9 milliondollars) in income tax and fees to extra-budgetary funds.

    Some 200 Interior Ministry troops and 40 OMON riot police guarded the courtroom Tuesday. Khodorkovsky's supporters chanted "Lawlessness" and "Not guilty" near the court after the sentence was announced. Enditem