Tag Archives: Russian billionaires

Culture, government, Jewish Community, Politics

Did you know that three Russian billionaires resigned from different boards?

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Petr Aven, Mikhail Fridman, and German Kahn, three Russian billionaires, have resigned from the board of Genesis Philanthropy Group, a Jewish grantmaking charity they formed in 2007. Sanctions on the three oligarchs were imposed by the EU and UK in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

LetterOne owns the health retail chain Holland & Barrett and a swathe of energy assets across Europe. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

From French vineyards to English football teams, sanctioned billionaires are scurrying to relocate and sell Western assets to escape confiscation. According to the release, the oligarchs’ resignations would have no effect on a $10 million payment that GPG had previously agreed to make to the Ukrainian Jewish community. Mikhail Fridman, a Ukrainian-born Jew, was one of the first Russian billionaires to speak out against the conflict in Ukraine, according to a statement addressed to LetterOne staff. In a recent interview with Bloomberg, he said that sanctioned oligarchs like him had little influence on Putin and that challenging him on Ukraine would be “death.” Despite mounting criticism from Russia’s elite, which has lost billions since the conflict began, analysts have told Insider that Putin is likely unconcerned with the oligarchs’ pushback, with just his small inner circle having his ear.

Reference


Three more Russian billionaires resign from the LetterOne board. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/mar/07/three-more-russian-billionaires-resign-from-letterone-board

Culture, government, human rights, Politics

Did you know that a mysterious superyacht docked in Italy has a crew that may include Putin’s bodyguards, according to activists working with Putin opponent Alexei Navalny?

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According to activists working with imprisoned Putin opponent Alexei Navalny, a mystery superyacht whose owner has not been publicly identified is manned by numerous personnel of a Russian state agency entrusted with defending Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images

The Scheherazade, one of the world’s biggest boats of its type, is a private superyacht, according to The New York Times. According to a personnel roster received by Pevchikh and Alburov in December 2020, all permanent crew members are Russian except for the ship’s commander. The United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union have imposed economic sanctions on Russia and confiscated several Russian billionaires’ luxury assets, including superyachts, in response to Russia’s continuing military attack on Ukraine. Navalny’s team is pleading with Italian authorities to confiscate the yacht if they discover that Putin owns it. Guy Bennett-Pearce, the superyacht’s skipper, told The Times that Italian investigators boarded the vessel early this month as part of an investigation launched by the Italian financial police. As a result, he was “forced” to turn over paperwork disclosing the owner’s name. Bennett-Pearce, a British native and the ship’s only non-Russian employee, would not rule out the possibility that the superyacht’s owner is Russian but could not comment more owing to a “watertight nondisclosure agreement” and said that the superyacht’s owner is not on any sanctions list.

Reference
Superyacht docked in Italy was outfitted by Putin’s …. https://soggros.com/index.php/2022/03/22/superyacht-docked-in-italy-was-outfitted-by-putins-protection-agency-activists-say/.

The Avalon Project: The Moscow Conference, October 1943. https://avalon.law.yale.edu/wwii/moscow.asp