BP CEO meets TNK-BP shareholder Fridman

By Katya Golubkova and Melissa Akin

MOSCOW (Reuters) - BP (BP.L) Chief Executive Tony Hayward met TNK-BP shareholder Mikhail Fridman on Wednesday to discuss a dispute over the Russian venture, kicking off a round of intensive talks over its future, sources said on Thursday.

"The meeting took place in Prague," Stan Polovets, chief executive of the Alfa-Access-Renova consortium, made up of Fridman and other Soviet-born billionaires who share control of TNK-BP with the British major.

At the same time, the 50-50 joint venture, the biggest single British investment in Russia, faced renewed pressure at home as a Siberian court upheld a challenge to TNK-BP management, which also received a new labour inspection notice.

Polovets said BP and AAR had agreed to abstain from further public comment on the substance of the meeting.

Another source familiar with the situation said the talks were unprecedented since the breakdown of their relationship in May, when BP's partners failed to appear for a board meeting in Cyprus, marking the outbreak of a struggle for control of TNK-BP.

The conflict reached a new peak this week when Hayward told investors its partners wanted to tear up the shareholder agreement concluded at the founding of the company in 2003, a charge his partners rejected.

The conflict is widely expected to end with some or all of TNK-BP in the hands of an expansionist state company such as Gazprom (GAZP.MM).

Fridman and Hayward were not necessarily participating in person in further talks, sources said.