Praxorium LLC, a limited liability company registered in the State of Wyoming, United States, operating the website countryriskreport.com, is the controller of personal data processed through this website.

This policy applies to information collected through this website. It does not apply to information governed by a signed engagement letter, protective order, or non-disclosure agreement, which take precedence in respect of case materials.

• Information you provide. Name, professional email address, law firm or organisation, jurisdiction, and any case summary you choose to submit through the consultation or order forms.
• Technical information. Language preference and navigation state stored locally in your browser. We do not operate third-party advertising or profiling technologies.
• Payment information. Card and billing data are collected and processed directly by Stripe, Inc. Praxorium LLC does not receive, store, or have access to full payment card numbers.

• To respond to your enquiry and conduct a conflict-of-interest review. Legal basis: steps taken at your request prior to entering a contract (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)); consent under PIPEDA.
• To perform an engagement and issue invoices. Legal basis: performance of a contract (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)).
• To maintain records of conflict checks and engagements. Legal basis: legitimate interests in professional record-keeping and demonstrating expert independence (GDPR Art. 6(1)(f)).
• To operate this website securely. Legal basis: legitimate interests (GDPR Art. 6(1)(f)); strictly necessary storage under UK PECR.

Praxorium LLC does not sell, rent, or share personal data with third parties for advertising or commercial purposes. Personal data is disclosed only:

• to Stripe, Inc. for the purpose of processing a payment you have initiated;
• where disclosure is required by law, court order, tribunal directions, or a lawful request from a competent authority; and
• where you have given explicit instructions to do so.

Praxorium LLC is established in the United States. Where personal data is transferred from the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, or Switzerland, such transfers are made on the basis of Standard Contractual Clauses or another lawful transfer mechanism, supplemented by the confidentiality measures described in our Confidentiality Policy.

Enquiries that do not result in an engagement are retained only for the period necessary to maintain a defensible record of the conflict check, and are then deleted. Engagement records are retained for the period required by applicable professional, tax, and limitation-period requirements, after which they are securely destroyed.

Subject to the applicable legal regime, you may have the right to:

• EEA / United Kingdom (GDPR, UK GDPR): access, rectification, erasure, restriction, portability, objection, and the right to withdraw consent at any time without affecting the lawfulness of prior processing. You may lodge a complaint with your supervisory authority or, in the United Kingdom, the Information Commissioner's Office.
• Canada (PIPEDA): access to your personal information, correction of inaccuracies, and withdrawal of consent subject to legal and contractual restrictions. You may complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada.
• California (CCPA/CPRA): the right to know, delete, and correct personal information, and to opt out of its sale or sharing. Praxorium LLC does not sell or share personal information as those terms are defined by the CPRA. You will not be discriminated against for exercising these rights.

To exercise any right, contact us using the details below. We will respond within the period prescribed by the applicable law.

We apply technical and organisational measures appropriate to the sensitivity of the material we handle, including transport encryption, access limitation, and the operational-security measures described in our Confidentiality Policy. No method of transmission over the internet is entirely secure, and you should not transmit privileged material by unencrypted email.

By accessing this website you agree to these Terms of Use. If you do not accept them, please do not use the website.

Praxorium LLC is an independent analytical and expert-witness services practice. It is not a law firm, does not practise law in any jurisdiction, does not provide legal advice, and does not represent clients.

Nothing on this website constitutes legal advice, a legal opinion, or a prediction as to the outcome of any proceeding. No attorney-client relationship is created by accessing this website, by submitting an enquiry, or by corresponding with Praxorium LLC. Attorneys remain solely responsible for the assessment, conduct, and filing decisions of their matters.

Submission of an enquiry, payment of a fee, or preliminary correspondence does not create an expert engagement. An engagement arises only upon execution of a written engagement letter by both parties, following a satisfactory conflict-of-interest review.

All content on this website — including text, analytical frameworks, methodology descriptions, research materials, and design elements — is the property of Praxorium LLC and is protected by United States and international copyright law.

You may view and print pages for the internal professional purposes of assessing whether to instruct Praxorium LLC. You may not reproduce, republish, redistribute, resell, or create derivative works from this content without prior written permission.

Expert declarations and reports prepared under an engagement are licensed to retaining counsel for use in the specific proceeding identified in the engagement letter. Copyright in the work product remains with Praxorium LLC. Use in an unrelated matter, or publication beyond the proceeding, requires prior written consent.

Country conditions evolve. Materials published on this website are general in nature, are provided for professional information, and are not tailored to any individual matter. They may not reflect developments occurring after the date of publication and must not be relied upon as a substitute for a commissioned expert declaration or country conditions report.

Payments are processed by Stripe, Inc. under its own terms and privacy policy. Where this website links to third-party materials, such links are provided for reference only and do not constitute endorsement. Praxorium LLC is not responsible for the content of external sites.

This website is provided on an "as is" basis. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, Praxorium LLC excludes liability for any loss arising from reliance on the general informational content of this website.

This clause concerns the website only. Liability in respect of professional work product is governed exclusively by the engagement letter applicable to that matter, and nothing here limits liability for fraud, fraudulent misrepresentation, or any liability that cannot lawfully be excluded.

These Terms of Use are governed by the laws of the State of Wyoming, United States, without regard to conflict-of-laws principles. The state and federal courts located in the State of Wyoming shall have exclusive jurisdiction over disputes arising from use of this website.

Where a consumer resides in the European Union or the United Kingdom, this clause does not deprive that consumer of the protection of mandatory provisions of the law of their country of habitual residence. Disputes arising under an engagement letter are governed by the dispute resolution provisions of that letter.

Praxorium LLC provides independent expert analysis only. The expert's duty is to assist the court or tribunal on matters within the expert's expertise. That duty overrides any obligation to the party instructing or paying the expert.

Opinions are formed on the basis of documented evidence, primary sources, and professional judgement — not on the basis of the outcome sought by any party.

Praxorium LLC is not a law firm and does not practise law in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the European Union, or any other jurisdiction. It does not provide legal advice, does not represent parties, and does not appear as an advocate.

Country conditions analysis, institutional-risk assessment, and expert testimony are provided to assist counsel and the tribunal. All legal strategy, admissibility judgements, procedural compliance, and filing decisions remain the exclusive responsibility of retaining counsel.

"Arthur Tikhan" is the chosen preferred professional name used consistently for public-facing professional work. It differs from the expert's legal name and is used as a personal-security measure, because the expert's analytical work concerns sensitive Russian governmental, law-enforcement, and judicial matters, and because the expert has previously served within, and litigated against, those institutions. It is a personal-security measure, not a device to obscure qualifications.

All qualifications, credentials, and professional history represented on this website are factual and independently verifiable. Legal identity and supporting credentials are disclosed confidentially to retaining counsel during the engagement process under a confidentiality agreement.

Where required for litigation, administrative proceedings, expert testimony, or judicial review, identity and qualifications are disclosed to authorized adjudicative bodies through an appropriate verification process — under a protective order, confidentiality undertaking, or other legally recognised procedure. Praxorium LLC will not offer expert evidence in a proceeding in which the tribunal declines to permit an appropriate mechanism for verification.

• Opinions address country conditions and institutional conduct. They do not determine credibility, which is a matter for the tribunal.
• Analytical inference is expressly distinguished from documented fact in all work product.
• Where the available evidence does not support a conclusion, this is stated. The expert does not opine beyond the limits of the evidence or beyond the limits of the expert's expertise.
• Document review does not constitute forensic authentication. Contextual analysis assesses consistency with documented Russian legal and administrative practice; it does not verify the physical origin of a document.

Praxorium LLC makes no representation as to the outcome of any proceeding. The weight to be given to expert evidence is a matter for the tribunal alone.

• Strictly necessary storage. Your language selection and consent choice are stored locally in your browser so the site functions correctly across visits. Under UK PECR and the ePrivacy Directive, strictly necessary storage does not require consent.
• Analytics (optional, off by default). Aggregated and anonymised measurement of how the website is used, to improve content and usability. Loaded only if you consent.
• Preferences (optional, off by default). Retains your settings between visits. Loaded only if you consent.

We do not use advertising cookies, cross-site trackers, social media pixels, data brokers, or profiling technologies of any kind.

Optional storage is disabled unless you enable it. You may accept, reject, or configure each category individually when you first visit, and you may change or withdraw your choice at any time using the Cookie Preferences control in the footer of every page. Rejecting optional storage does not restrict access to any part of this website.

You may also block or delete storage through your browser settings. Doing so may reset your language preference on each visit.

• EEA / United Kingdom: consent for non-essential storage is obtained on an opt-in basis under the GDPR and PECR, and may be withdrawn at any time.
• Canada: meaningful consent is obtained in accordance with PIPEDA.
• California: Praxorium LLC does not sell or share personal information as those terms are defined by the CCPA/CPRA. A "Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information" control is nevertheless provided in the footer of every page.

This website has been designed and tested to conform substantially to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, Level AA. It is intended to be compatible with the accessibility expectations reflected in the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 508 (United States), the Accessible Canada Act and AODA (Canada), and the European Accessibility Act and EN 301 549 (European Union).

• Semantic HTML structure with landmark regions and a skip-to-content link.
• Full keyboard operability, including menus, tabbed forms, and the cookie preference dialogue; visible focus indicators throughout.
• All form fields carry programmatically associated labels; validation errors are announced to assistive technology.
• ARIA states applied to navigation, tabs, dialogues, and the language selector.
• Colour contrast tested against WCAG AA thresholds; colour is never the sole means of conveying information.
• Content available in English, Russian, German, French, and Spanish, with the page language exposed to assistive technology.

The professional curriculum vitae is provided as a PDF. If you require this document, or any material published on this website, in an alternative accessible format, we will provide it promptly and at no charge.

We welcome reports of accessibility barriers. Please contact us at contact@countryriskreport.com with the page concerned and the difficulty encountered. We aim to acknowledge accessibility reports within five business days and to remedy confirmed barriers promptly.

No engagement is accepted, and no substantive work is undertaken, until a formal conflict-of-interest review has been completed. The review is conducted upon receipt of the initial enquiry and the outcome is communicated to instructing counsel, ordinarily within 24 hours on business days.

• Prior involvement, in any capacity, in the matter or in a directly related proceeding.
• Prior or current engagement by an opposing party in the same matter.
• Personal relationship with a party, witness, or decision-maker in the proceeding.
• Any institutional affiliation, past or present, capable of giving rise to a reasonable apprehension of bias.
• Any financial or other interest in the outcome of the proceeding.

Where a potential conflict is identified, it is disclosed in writing to instructing counsel. Praxorium LLC does not accept an engagement where a conflict cannot be resolved consistently with the expert's overriding duty to the court or tribunal.

The expert's professional history — including prior service within Russian state institutions and prior litigation against them — is disclosed on this website and in the curriculum vitae provided to retaining counsel, so that it may be examined and, where appropriate, tested in cross-examination.

The obligation to identify and disclose conflicts is continuing. If circumstances change during an engagement, instructing counsel is notified promptly, and the expert will withdraw where continued instruction would be inconsistent with the duty of independence.

Fees are fixed at engagement or charged at a stated hourly rate, and are payable irrespective of the outcome of the proceeding.

Praxorium LLC does not accept contingency fees, success fees, or any compensation contingent upon the outcome of a proceeding. This is a non-negotiable condition of engagement. Any arrangement creating a financial incentive to alter an expert opinion would compromise both the integrity of the analysis and the admissibility and weight of the evidence.

All client communications, case materials, applicant identities, and the existence of an engagement are treated as strictly confidential. No information is disclosed to any third party without the prior written consent of retaining counsel, save where disclosure is compelled by law, court order, or tribunal direction — in which case counsel is notified in advance wherever lawfully permitted.

These obligations survive the termination of the engagement and are not time-limited.

Because applicants and their families may remain exposed to risk in the Russian Federation, no identifying detail concerning an applicant is published, cited in any research material, or used as a case study, whether during or after a proceeding — including in anonymised form where re-identification is reasonably foreseeable.

• Case materials are accessible only to the expert conducting the engagement.
• Materials are stored under access control and encryption in transit.
• Website enquiries should contain only a general description sufficient for a conflict check; privileged material should be transmitted only after an engagement letter is executed and by the secure means agreed with counsel.
• Materials are securely destroyed at the end of the applicable retention period, subject to any litigation hold or professional record-keeping requirement.

Praxorium LLC is not a law firm and cannot itself create attorney-client privilege. Where an expert is retained by counsel, the work may attract protection as consulting-expert or litigation work product under the law of the relevant jurisdiction. Determining and preserving any applicable privilege or protection is the responsibility of retaining counsel, and Praxorium LLC will conduct the engagement in accordance with counsel's written instructions for that purpose.

Praxorium LLC will execute a non-disclosure agreement or protective undertaking at counsel's request. Where the terms of an NDA, protective order, or engagement letter impose obligations stricter than this policy, those terms prevail.