Warring TNK-BP appoints Schröder

BP'S troubled Russian arm has appointed ex-German leader Gerhard Schröder to its board in a bid to end the warring which saw it become a laughing stock last year.

The appointment of former Chancellor Schröder as a director of TNK-BP will, however, raise eyebrows in Germany, where he has been roundly criticised for taking a key post with the Russian state monopoly Gazprom.

A power struggle at TNK-BP last year between BP and its four Russian oligarch partners who own 50% of the company saw the sacking of chief executive and BP placeman Bob Dudley and the expulsion from Moscow of BP staffers.

A new TNK-BP chief executive is yet to be appointed but BP and the oligarchs took a step today along the way to boardroom peace with the appointment of three independent directors, including Schröder.

The others are Jim Leng, soon to be chairman of Rio Tinto, and Alexander Shokhin, president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs.