Ilya Zaslavsky and his brother Alexander received one-year suspended sentences and two years probation after being convicted of industrial espionage Thursday at the Tverskoi District Court, court spokeswoman Alexandra Berezina told The Moscow Times.
Berezina declined to give further details because the trial of the two brothers was closed to the public.
The charges against the Zaslavsky brothers emerged last year during a high-profile power struggle between the Russian and British owners of TNK-BP.
Unidentified officials with the Federal Security Service, or FSB, said the brothers, who also have Russian citizenship, had collected classified information about state energy giant Gazprom, Interfax reported Thursday.
The official said the FSB had been tipped off by an employee of a domestic energy firm who claimed that the brothers had tried to buy company secrets from him.
"The court found that the evidence provided by the FSB about Ilya and Alexander Zaslavsky's criminal behavior fully confirmed their guilt," the official said.
The brothers were arrested in March last year as TNK-BP's owners fought over their 50-50 ownership structure. About the same time, the company came under scrutiny from law enforcement agencies -- a development that some observers said suggested that one side was playing dirty by unfairly enlisting state assistance.
But other observers linked the law enforcement scrutiny to a long-running dispute between Gazprom and TNK-BP over control of TNK-BP's flagship Kovykta gas field, saying Gazprom was trying to take over TNK-BP as well.
At the time of his arrest, Ilya Zaslavsky, then 29, worked as a manager in TNK-BP's international affairs office. A source in the company said Thursday that he was still employed at TNK-BP, Reuters reported.
Calls and e-mails to the firm's press office went unanswered Thursday.
A Gazprom spokeswoman said the company would not comment on the case.
Reached by telephone Thursday, Ilya Zaslavsky declined to comment on the verdict or identify his lawyers.
Alexander Zaslavsky, who is three years older than his brother, worked as an independent energy consultant and headed the British Alumni Club, a graduate network set up by the British Council.
A council spokesman on Thursday confirmed that Alexander Zaslavsky is president of the alumni club but said he had never worked for the British Council.
"Alexander Zaslavsky is not an employee of the British Council and has never worked for us in any capacity," the spokesman said in e-mailed comments. He added that the British Alumni Club was a self-governing organization and that Zaslavsky has not participated in club activities since March 2008.
The British Council at the time had been forced to close most of its offices in Russia because of a dispute that the Foreign Ministry has linked to British demands that State Duma Deputy Andrei Lugovoi be extradited to face murder charges in the poisoning death of former security services officer Alexander Litvinenko.
The Zaslavsky brothers both graduated from Oxford University, and Ilya still heads the Moscow Oxford Society, according to the organization's web site.
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