Bonus: Russian Cutoff and Lord Browne

Two news items of note:

Russian oil cutoff in Germany

Over the last month, Russian oil supplies to Germany have been curtailed in an apparent dispute with Lukoil. The cut of about 50,000 barrels a day, in figures compiled by Reuters, may be restored in the coming days because of a compromise. The supply disruption does not appear on first glance to be linked to the Russian government. But it does come after Russia came under European criticism for cutting supplies to Ukraine and Belarus over the last couple of years. Read Reuters story

Back At Work: John Browne

Officially John Browne is going to work for a seven-year-old private equity company. But while doing so he will work with the repository of the corporate world’s marquee names of the past – the powerful Carlyle Group. He is joining to run the new London office of Riverstone Holdings, which is a partnership with Carlyle in energy investments, Carlyle announced on its Web site.

The 59-year-old Browne brought BP into some of the biggest deals in the former Soviet Union – offshore Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, operatorship of the Baku-Ceyhan Pipeline, and the TNK-BP partnership in Russia.

For years, Browne was Britain’s most famous businessman, and was even knighted as Lord of Madingley. But he withstood unaccustomed tabloid treatment in May when he resigned from BP after a scandal involving a former lover.

While he will be Riverside’s biggest name, he is hardly so in the Carlyle crowd. Former President George H.W. Bush and former British Prime Minister John Major were advisers there. Its current roster includes Richard Darman, former director of the Office of Management and Budget under Bush Sr.; Mack McLarty, former chief of staff to Bill Clinton and president of Kissinger McLarty Associates; Karl Otto Pohl, former president of Germany’s Bundesbank; Arthur Levitt, former head of the SEC; and Norman Pearlstine, who formerly edited both Time and The Wall Street Journal. The Bloomberg story