MOSCOW, September 20 - RAPSI. The European court will pass its decision in the lawsuit filed by Mikhail Khodorkovsky's former oil company against Russia, the court reported on its website. YUKOS seeks $98 billion from the Russian government for violating its rights.

Although Russia will have to obey the court's order, experts are confident that the YUKOS claim will be significantly reduced to the tens of thousands of dollars.

The YUKOS case has been one of the most high profile in Russia in recent years.

In the early 2000s, the authorities accused the executives of YUKOS, then the country's largest oil company, of embezzlement and tax evasion.

YUKOS was later called a bankrupt and its assets were transferred to the state-run Rosneft. Many in the West believe the case against YUKOS was politically driven, but Moscow denies the charges.

YUKOS appealed to the Strasbourg court in 2004 against the Russian tax authorities for illegal property seizure. The company says the tax authorities violated several clauses of the European Convention of Human Rights. The court accepted the claim in 2009.