Romanov claims girl lied to trick Rix into under-age sex

In an interview, Mr Romanov said he was taken aback by the level of publicity created by his decision to appoint Rix, who was sentenced to 12 months in prison and placed on the sex offenders' register in 1999.

The Lithuanian multi-millionaire implied it was on a par with what might be expected had he appointed a "gangster or a corrupt policeman".

The interview will be shown tonight as part of a BBC Scotland documentary, Frontline Scotland: The Romanov Revolution, which reveals that the Bosnian Serb government ordered an investigation into allegations that millions of pounds of taxes were not being paid by one of Mr Romanov's companies.

However, a spokesman for Mr Romanov told The Scotsman that he "understood" the investigation had been cancelled following a recent meeting between Mr Romanov and the Bosnian Serb prime minister, Adnan Terzic.

The appointment of Rix, a former coach at Chelsea, and his previous conviction attracted significant media coverage and there was a backlash from fans who felt he was not of sufficient stature for the job. Some also felt the nature of his crime should have prevented him from getting the job.

However, Mr Romanov, who the programme said was placed on a "death list" during the Soviet era because of his private enterprise operations, said he was "surprised that the tabloid press got involved".

"I cannot understand when a girl comes and tricks a hero such as this coach and says she's older than she is and then sells the story for hundreds of thousands. And then this story comes to life a second time - the first time they 'treat' the English and now the Scottish public - which I think is a systematic crime involving all those who want to make money out of it," he said, speaking through a translator.

"My responsibility is to defend my staff and players as much as I can. Injustice that I see gives me my strength."

The idea that the girl had lied about her age was a central part of the arguments used by Rix's lawyers in the court case.

But the prosecution said Rix, a father of four, knew she was 15 because when he was telling her about playing in the 1982 World Cup, she had said she was born in that year and then tried to cover up the mistake.

The judge decided it was "all too easy for a grown man to say, 'She looked older, she said she was 16 and I believed her.'"

He added: "There is no evidence in this case at all to suggest, let alone to establish, that this girl deliberately set out to seduce you, no evidence that she was the one who made all the running and no evidence of her initiating any sexual activity."

Mr Romanov's spokesman was yesterday at pains to stress that his employer's remarks referred to Rix as a footballing hero at the time of the offence.

"That's entirely different from a comment upon his personal situation," he said.

When Mr Rix was given the job following the sacking of manager George Burley, a poll on a Hearts supporters' website found 86 per cent of respondents were against the decision.

Callum Anderson, a leading fan who runs the Dickens Hearts supporters club, said yesterday that while he supported the club, he was still unhappy with Rix's appointment. "If Vladimir Romanov had a 15-year-old daughter and she brought home a 41-year-old boyfriend, I wonder what he would say," he said.

"The man [Mr Rix] is still on the sex offenders' register and he still has to inform the police if he moves house. He's not a hero. He was a weak man. He's obviously made a huge mistake and he's not finished paying for it until he is off the sex offenders' register."

The documentary also examines Mr Romanov's financial dealings and features the Bosnian Serb finance minister Svetlana Cenic, who reveals that she ordered raids by tax inspectors on a large aluminium plant called Birac over concerns that "tens of millions of dollars" were owed to the government in taxes.

The plant, near Zvornik in the Serbian part of Bosnia-Herzegovina, is a cornerstone of the Romanov business empire.

Ms Cenic said the raids were ordered "because I didn't get an answer to my questions: where the money goes, where the profits go?

"We're talking about ... the future of this company, the future of so many people and their families. I am asking what happens to the difference in prices. The production price is $200 per tonne [of aluminium]. The market price is something below $400. It is a huge difference.

"Where does that profit go, who's taking the profits and why can't we get any taxes on that?"

However, a spokesman for Mr Romanov told The Scotsman last night that the BBC interview took place two to three weeks ago and that Mr Romanov had since met Ms Cenic and the Bosnian Serb prime minister.

"The result of that was any investigation was cancelled. That's my understanding. That would need to be confirmed with them [the Bosnian Serb government]," he said. "I'm hearing this from Lithuania but I haven't heard anything from Mr Romanov directly because he's not been contactable."

A spokeswoman for Ms Cenic said she was unavailable as she was in a meeting with representatives of the International Monetary Fund yesterday.

Asked about the investigation by Frontline Scotland, Mr Romanov said: "If a finance minister does not know how to decipher the balance sheet it is his problem. Unfortunately, it is not just his problem, it is the problem of the whole country - it is a lack of economic literacy."

He said when he bought the plant he knew he would be "subjected to criticism".

"I know the political game," he said, but added he had made significant investment in the plant, turning it from a ruin into a thriving company. "I'm sorry. No politician has a future who tries to interfere with me doing that. He is a political corpse."

The documentary reports claims that the aluminium produced at Birac is actually sold by a different company in the Romanov empire, which takes biggest slice of the profits made. This means the second biggest share-holder in the plant, the Bosnian Serb state pension fund, misses out on the substantial dividend that would result if Birac sold the aluminium itself.

"In blunt terms," the programme reports, the allegation is that Bosnian Serb pensioners, who live on an average of 70 a month, are losing out while Hearts receives money to bring in new players.

Dragan Jerinic, editor-in-chief of the newspaper Nezavisne Novine, said: "It's not right that Vladimir Romanov buys players for his Scottish football club with the money out of Birac. Part of that money should stay here."