Moscow mayor's wife links attacks to 2012 election

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The billionaire wife of Moscow's mayor has accused the Kremlin of mounting a campaign against her husband to help position President Dmitry Medvedev for a re-election bid in 2012.

Yuri Luzhkov, mayor since 1992, left at the weekend for a holiday in Austria amid a furious campaign against him in state-controlled media and sharp criticism from Medvedev's Kremlin administration.

His wife Yelena Baturina, Russia's richest woman according to Forbes magazine, said the attacks were all about 2012.

"I think all of this is done for one person only -- the president," she told Monday's edition of the opposition New Times magazine via videolink from Austria.

Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have said one of them will run for president in 2012, and most Russians expect Putin to return to the post he held from 2000 to 2008.

"We kind of have two candidates now. Who will become the candidate in 2012 is an open question," Baturina said.

"There are people in the president's administration who are afraid that the mayor may take the side of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin."

Increased activity by both in recent weeks has prompted analysts to say the election campaign has effectively started.

For Medvedev, sacking Luzhkov would be the boldest move of a presidency that many say has brought more talk than action. Equally, if Medvedev fails to follow through on his attacks, he will suffer a major loss of face.

Lacing her remarks liberally with slang and coarse language, Baturina criticised the imprisonment of oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, seen by critics as politically motivated, and drew parallels with the attacks on her husband.

She said the Kremlin administration had given direct orders to air anti-Luzhkov documentaries on the NTV television channel, controlled by the state-owned gas monopoly Gazprom.

No one at the Kremlin was available to comment on the allegation.

Baturina said she was mystified by silence on the showdown from Putin. Medvedev has himself also said very little about Luzhkov himself, leaving the work to unnamed Kremlin sources.

"I do not understand why both leaders pretend nothing is happening when the country is going nuts," Baturina said.

(Writing by Gleb Bryanski; Editing by Kevin Liffey)