Shtokmanovskoye award blasted

This paper reports that Russian President Boris Yeltsin's recent decree giving the domestic joint stock company Rosshelf all rights to develop supergiant Shtokmanovskoye gas/condensate field in the Barents Sea is viewed by Moscow's reformist press as appeasement of his conservative critics and of the nation's still powerful military/industrial complex. The decision, made late last month, favoring Rosshelf (Russian Company for Shelf Development) was made at the expense of competitor Arkticheskaya Zvezda (Arctic Star), a group that includes Conoco Inc., Norsk Hydro AS, Neste Oy, and Metra