2020考研英語閱讀理解精讀100篇：Unit 62

Unit 62

The website of Telenor, a state-controlled Norwegian telecoms firm, has a special section dedicated to its investments in Russia and its dispute with Alfa Group, its Russian partner. It is a long and unhappy saga filled with headings such as “Geneva arbitration”, “Court abuses” and “Black PR campaigns”. Telenor and Altima, the telecoms arm of Alfa, are shareholders in both VimpelCom of Russia and Kyivstar of Ukraine. In 2004 Altima, which wanted to expand its business in Ukraine further, suggested that VimpelCom buy another Ukrainian telecoms firm. Telenor resisted, saying that the price was too high. Altima accused Telenor of sabotaging its growth.

For several years the dispute rambled on, with several attempts at arbitration and suits and countersuits in various courts around the world. Then a company called Farimex entered the fray. It is registered in the British Virgin Islands and owns a 0.002% stake in VimpelCom. It complained to a court in Siberia that Telenor（which has no business in Siberia）had obstructed VimpelCom’s entry into the Ukrainian market. The Siberian court ordered Telenor to pay compensation of $2.8 billion, a sum that was reduced to $1.7 billion on appeal. When Telenor refused to pay, arguing that it had not exhausted its appeals, another court seized most of Telenor’s 30% stake in VimpelCom. On June 19th Russia’s bailiffs ordered the auction of the stake to raise the $1.7 billion. In most countries this would be called expropriation.

Telenor says it believes the Farimex case is connected to its dispute with Alfa Group. It believes that it could reach an agreement with Alfa, provided its troubles with Farimex come to an end. But Mikhail Fridman, the boss of Alfa Group, says it is not affiliated with Farimex in any way, although he supports its complaint. Jens Stoltenberg, Norway’s prime minister, has raised the subject of Telenor’s dispute with Vladimir Putin, his Russian counterpart, who said the government was impartial. But as Telenor points out, Mr Putin himself has admitted that Russia’s courts are unpredictable and are in urgent need of reform.

The clearest indictment of Russia’s investment climate came a few days ago from IKEA, a Swedish retail chain, whose local operation has grown quickly since it opened its first store near Moscow in 2000. On June 23rd IKEA said it was suspending its investment in Russia because of the “unpredictable character of administrative procedures”, a euphemism for graft.

Among 181 countries surveyed by the World Bank for ease of doing business, Russia occupies 120th place, below Nigeria. Transparency International gives Russia barely two points out of ten—its worst performance in ten years, which puts it on a par with Kenya. Until recently the Kremlin had no need to worry about things like property rights and the rule of law. Its oil wealth ensured an economic boom, no matter how it treated investors. Most of the money that flowed into the country came in the form of loans rather than foreign direct investment. Now the loans have dried up. The Russian economy is forecast to contract by 8.5% this year, and it still blames the global economic crisis for its misfortunes. A closer look at IKEA and Telenor, as well as many of Russia’s own companies, suggests the truth is more complicated.

注（1）：本文選自Economist；

注（2）：本文習(xí)題命題模仿對象：第1、2、3、5、4題分別模仿1997年真題Text 1第1、2、3、5題和Text 3第2題。

1. From the first two paragraphs we can learn that ______.

A) this article will focus on how Telenor fights against Alfa Group

B) this article will describe how Telenor finishes the saga on its website

C) the dispute between Telenor and Alfa causes severe legal problems

D) the story of Telenor and Alfa is used to introduce the main topic

2. The author added “which has no business in Siberia”（Line 4, Paragraph 2）to indicate that ______.

A) Telenor was not interested in developing business in Siberia

B) it was ridiculous for Farimex to sue Telenor in Siberia

C) the Siberian court failed to make an impartial judgment

D) Telenor went to the appeal court because it was not satisfied with the Siberian court

3. Telenor and IKEA will probably agree that ______.

A) Russia should adjust its attitude toward cooperating with foreign companies

B) the Russian legal system is in need of much improvement

C) administrative procedures should be simplified in Russia

D) Russia should emphasize more on property rights

4. The word “euphemism”（Line 4, Paragraph 4）most probably means ______.

A) indirect expression

B) substitution

C) secret word

D) password

5. The author’s attitude towards Russia’s investment climate seems to be ______.

A) positive

B) suspicious

C) negative

D) indifferent

篇章剖析

本文由外國公司與俄羅斯公司的商業(yè)和法律爭端引出了俄羅斯的投資環(huán)境問題。第一段首先提出問題，介紹了挪威電信公司Telenor與其俄羅斯合作伙伴Alfa集團(tuán)之間的爭端及緣起；第二、三段則較為詳細(xì)地描述了二者之間的爭端以及Farimex的介入帶來的進(jìn)一步影響；第四、五段則指出，各方對俄羅斯投資環(huán)境的評價(jià)都很低，這會影響俄羅斯經(jīng)濟(jì)的發(fā)展，但目前該國依然把問題歸咎于經(jīng)濟(jì)危機(jī)這個(gè)外在因素。

詞匯注釋

saga /?sɑ?g?/ n. 英雄傳說，長篇故事

sabotage /?s?b?tɑ??/ v. 蓄意破壞；妨害

ramble /?r?mbl/ v. 閑逛；蔓延

arbitration /?ɑ?b??tre??n/ n. 仲裁，調(diào)定；公斷

fray /fre?/ n. 吵架；爭論

bailiff /?be?l?f/ n. 法警；地方長官

expropriation /?eks?pr??pri?e???n/ n. 沒收；征用

affiliate /??f?lie?t/ v. 發(fā)生聯(lián)系；參加

impartial /?m?pɑ???l/ adj. 不偏不倚的，公正的，無偏見的

suspend /s??spend/ v. 使中止

euphemism /?ju?f?m?z?m/ n. 婉轉(zhuǎn)的說法；委婉語

graft /grɑ?ft/ n. 賄賂；行賄；行賄得到的利益

難句突破

The clearest indictment of Russia’s investment climate came a few days ago from IKEA, a Swedish retail chain, whose local operation has grown quickly since it opened its first store near Moscow in 2000.

主體句式：The clearest indictment came from IKEA.

結(jié)構(gòu)分析：這個(gè)句子的主體句式比較容易理解，of Russia’s investment climate用來修飾indictment，給出控訴的內(nèi)容，這里的“climate”指的并不是氣候，而是環(huán)境。IKEA后面首先跟了一個(gè)同位語，對其進(jìn)行簡單的解釋，同位語后面又用了一個(gè)由whose引導(dǎo)的定語從句進(jìn)一步說明宜家在俄羅斯的經(jīng)營情況，該定語從句里面還包含了一個(gè)由since引導(dǎo)的時(shí)間狀語從句。

句子譯文：幾天前宜家對俄羅斯投資環(huán)境的投訴是相關(guān)控訴中最明確的一次。這家瑞典連鎖企業(yè)自2000年在莫斯科附近開設(shè)第一家店以來，在當(dāng)?shù)氐慕?jīng)營發(fā)展速度很快。

題目分析

1. D 推理題。本題雖然題干要求關(guān)注前兩段，但也不能忽視這兩段與全文的聯(lián)系，不能只見樹木不見森林。從后文看，前兩段講到兩家公司的矛盾主要是為后面揭露俄羅斯的投資環(huán)境問題做鋪墊，因此D是最佳答案。前三個(gè)選項(xiàng)都過于關(guān)注這兩段中的細(xì)節(jié)，沒有很好地把握這兩段在整篇文章中的作用。

2. B 語義題。題干所指部分在文中第二段的括號里面，很顯然這是作者對前面內(nèi)容的補(bǔ)充說明，而且這句話也表達(dá)了作者自己的觀點(diǎn)。此處表明，作者認(rèn)為Farimex在一個(gè)Telenor沒有業(yè)務(wù)的地方起訴它很荒謬，所以答案是B。其他三個(gè)選項(xiàng)都沒有表達(dá)出這個(gè)意思。

3. A 細(xì)節(jié)題。本題可以使用排除法。首先B項(xiàng)的表述僅適用于Telenor，C項(xiàng)的表述僅適用于宜家，D項(xiàng)提到的產(chǎn)權(quán)與兩者都沒有關(guān)系。從全文來看，這兩家公司都不滿俄羅斯對待外國企業(yè)的態(tài)度，因此A是最佳答案。

4. A 語義題。從上下文看，宜家想強(qiáng)調(diào)的是俄羅斯官員的graft（以權(quán)謀私），但是公司用了一個(gè)比較好聽的說法“行政程序的不可預(yù)測性”，也就是一個(gè)比較間接的表達(dá)方式，因此A項(xiàng)在意義上最符合。

5. C 情感態(tài)度題。本文主要說明的是俄羅斯沒有給外國企業(yè)創(chuàng)造良好的投資環(huán)境，最后一段指出“俄羅斯仍然將它的不幸歸咎于全球經(jīng)濟(jì)危機(jī)。仔細(xì)了解一下宜家或者Telenor，還有許多俄羅斯的本土公司，你會發(fā)現(xiàn)實(shí)際情況要復(fù)雜得多”，也就是說俄羅斯依舊沒有認(rèn)識到自身的問題，而簡單歸咎于外因。整體看來，作者對該國投資環(huán)境的態(tài)度是負(fù)面的，所以答案為C。

參考譯文

挪威國有電信公司Telenor的網(wǎng)站上有一個(gè)專欄，專門討論該公司在俄羅斯的投資情況以及與俄羅斯合作伙伴Alfa集團(tuán)之間的爭端。這就像是一個(gè)沒完沒了且不愉快的長篇故事，充滿了諸如“日內(nèi)瓦仲裁”、“法庭濫用權(quán)力”、“黑色公關(guān)活動(dòng)”等文章標(biāo)題。Telenor和Alfa的電信子公司Altima都擁有俄羅斯VimpelCom公司和烏克蘭Kyivstar公司的股份。2004年，Altima希望在烏克蘭進(jìn)一步拓展業(yè)務(wù)，因而建議VimpelCom公司收購烏克蘭的另一家電信公司。但Telenor卻反對這次收購，原因是收購價(jià)格太高。于是Altima就控告Telenor蓄意阻撓其發(fā)展。

接下來的幾年里，圍繞這一問題的爭端持續(xù)不斷，一次又一次地申請仲裁、一次又一次地在世界各地的法院提起訴訟和反訴訟。此后，一家名為Farimex的公司也加入了這場紛爭。Farimex是一家在英國維京群島注冊的公司，擁有VimpelCom 0.002%的股份。它向西伯利亞的法院起訴Telenor（Telenor在西伯利亞并沒有業(yè)務(wù)）阻礙VimpelCom進(jìn)入烏克蘭市場。西伯利亞法庭下令Telenor支付28億美元賠償金，經(jīng)上訴后賠償金額降低到了17億美元。就在Telenor拒絕支付賠償，聲稱它還有權(quán)繼續(xù)上訴時(shí)，另一家法院沒收了Telenor在VimpelCom30%股份的大部分。6月19日，俄羅斯法院執(zhí)行官下令拍賣這些股份，以籌集17億美元賠償金。在大多數(shù)國家，這一舉動(dòng)被稱為充公。

Telenor表示，它相信Farimex案與它和Alfa集團(tuán)的爭端有關(guān)。Telenor還相信，如果公司解決了與Farimex之間的問題，那么它將可以與Alfa達(dá)成協(xié)議。Alfa集團(tuán)老總米哈伊爾·弗里德曼則聲稱，Alfa與Telenor之間的糾葛和Farimex一點(diǎn)關(guān)系都沒有，雖然他支持后者的起訴。挪威首相延斯·斯托爾滕貝格曾向俄羅斯總理弗拉基米爾·普京提起過Telenor爭端，而普京表示政府是公正的。但正如Telenor指出的，普京先生本人也承認(rèn)俄羅斯法院難以預(yù)料，亟需改革。

幾天前宜家對俄羅斯投資環(huán)境的投訴是相關(guān)控訴中最明確的一次。這家瑞典連鎖企業(yè)自2000年在莫斯科附近開設(shè)第一家店以來，在當(dāng)?shù)氐慕?jīng)營發(fā)展速度很快。6月23日，宜家表示因?yàn)椤靶姓绦虻牟豢深A(yù)測性”（這只是以權(quán)謀私的委婉說法），它將暫停在俄羅斯的投資。

世界銀行開展了一項(xiàng)關(guān)于經(jīng)商便利程度的調(diào)查。在被調(diào)查的181個(gè)國家中，俄羅斯位于尼日利亞之后，列第120位。透明國際給俄羅斯打出的分?jǐn)?shù)僅為2分（總分為10分）——這是該國十年來的最差表現(xiàn)，與肯尼亞旗鼓相當(dāng)。直到不久前，克里姆林宮還無需為產(chǎn)權(quán)或法律規(guī)則這樣的問題操心。不論它如何對待投資者，石油產(chǎn)業(yè)帶來的財(cái)富已足夠確保其經(jīng)濟(jì)的繁榮發(fā)展。流入這個(gè)國家的大部分錢都以貸款而非他國直接投資的形式進(jìn)入。而現(xiàn)在，這些貸款都已枯竭。預(yù)計(jì)今年俄羅斯經(jīng)濟(jì)將收縮8.5%，而它仍然將其不幸歸咎于全球經(jīng)濟(jì)危機(jī)。仔細(xì)了解一下宜家或者Telenor，以及許多俄羅斯的本土公司，你會發(fā)現(xiàn)實(shí)際情況要復(fù)雜得多。