RusEnergy

Wednesday, March 9, 2005 Bloomberg - Tatneft, Russia's seventh-largest oil producer, said it overstated profit when it reported financial results for 2001, 2002 and the first six months of 2003 because of an accounting mistake. The mistake reduced Tatneft's expenditures as calculated under U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles in the 2 1/2-year period by $144.3 million, causing a corresponding increase in net income, Tatneft said Saturday in a statement. The mistake was not connected to transactions questioned by auditors Ernst & Young that have delayed the release of Tatneft's full-year 2003 results. Tatneft will release corrected financial statements for 2001, 2002 and for the first and second halves of 2003 after independent legal consultants finish an investigation into the transactions questioned by Ernst & Young. The discovery of the mistake was not due to any tax investigation by authorities, Tatneft said.