British American Tobacco Will Advise Ukraine’s President on FDI

According to the Presidential Decree #613, President Yushchenko appointed several foreign CEOs to the Presidential Committee on Foreign Direct Investments. Now the FDI committee includes CEOs of several foreign companies such as British-American Tobacco, Siemens AG, ArcellorMittal, Hungary's OTP Bank, and Austria's Raiffeisen Bank. In other words, President Yushchenko's advisers will represent tobacco, steel, electronics, and banking industries. Lakshmi Mittal, a 58-year-old CEO of ArcellorMittal, is the most interesting choice among all new advisers. One, Mr. Mittal is extremely rich. The Forbes places Mr. Mittal with $19.3 billion in net worth on the eighth place in the World's Billionaires List. Two, Mr. Mittal represents British-Indian steel company that is the major rival of Ukraine's steel tycoons such as Rinat Akhmetov and Viktor Pinchuk.