The journalist organization OCCRP made a revelation about the secret cooperation of the Russian ruling elite. It is hardly possible to get closer to proving Putin’s corruption, writes MOT editor Jyri Hänninen.
15:00 • Updated 3:25 PM
The President of Russia Vladimir Putin is estimated to be the richest man in the world. Putin’s neighbors have seized hundreds of billions of euros in assets, including stakes in large Russian energy companies.
This has always been vehemently denied by the Kremlin. A document proving that Putin is the owner of the secret billions is hardly ever to be found.
OCCRP journalists named Putin a related cooperative for its discovery. It manages billions of euros in holdings. Traces also repeatedly lead to President Putin or his family.
Palace, yachts, private jets
The revelation was born of one small but important point.
Reporters found that investigations related to Putin or his close associates often revealed the same web address, LLCInvest.ru.
Several different companies that officially have nothing to do with each other used the same LLCInvest.ru email or web address. Another unifying factor was the close distance between the companies and Russia Rossiya, Russia’s largest bank. The bank owns some of the companies in the network directly or through its employees.
Bank Rossiya is commonly referred to as Putin’s bank – and for good reason. The bank has grown into a giant with the help of Putin and the Russian state. Bank Rossiya is also owned by Putin’s close associates.
Journalists found 86 companies, foundations or associations connected in this way. The combined value of these assets is more than four billion euros. The assets consist of high-value real estate, yachts, private jets and shares in large Russian companies. The companies in the network use the same addresses, directors and auditors.
Several holdings directly linked to Vladimir Putin have also been organized through the network:
The cooperative consists of Putin’s close associates
Some of the companies in the network have previously been in the public eye, above all, in stories about Putin’s alleged holdings.
The Kremlin’s response to allegations of corruption is often almost identical: look, the mansion or yacht is owned by someone else. That someone else is usually someone who is close to Putin.
The secret consortium revealed by the OCCRP involves several people belonging to Putin’s close circle, the best known in Finland being the Russian-Finnish oligarch Gennady Tymoshenko. Other members include Svetlana Krivonogikh, allegedly Putin’s ex-mistress and daughter’s mother, Putin’s childhood friend Arkadi Rotenberg, and Putin’s late childhood friend. Petr Kolbinof which the MOT editorial team has also published an extensive report.
Until now, corruption cases linked to Putin have been largely investigated one at a time. Related companies – which own valuable properties, for example – have been considered as independent operators. According to the OCCRP, companies are managed as a single group consisting of several subsidiaries.
“The leaked email metadata shows that LLCInvest, which looks outwardly independent of each other, repeatedly communicates in a way that could only be expected of people working together,” OCCRP writes in its story.
Russian investigative journalist Roman Anin has described in previous MOT delivery cases what such arrangements are likely to be about.
– In this context, in Russia we use a concept like “swimming pool”. All the money and possessions are in this pool, which is managed by Putin. The money in the pool is then used for different purposes.
“It could mean buying real estate for employees of the presidential administration, but it could just as well finance secret foreign operations, such as poisoning opponents of the Kremlin,” Anin told the MOT in October 2021.
Who runs a secret cooperative?
So what makes the OCCRP article so flammable?
The holdings and caches of President Putin’s associates have been investigated for several years. The MOT editorial team has also been involved in making several articles about the secret ownership arrangements of Gennady Timtchenko, the former financier of the Jokers.
Putin’s friends have made fabulous riches with the help of the Russian state. However, Putin has always denied benefiting from the vast wealth of his associates. To the OCCRP, a Kremlin representative responded to the request for comment, stating that “the President of the Russian Federation is in no way associated with the holdings or organizations you mention.”
Representatives of the companies belonging to the cooperative either refused to be interviewed or said anonymously that they did not know who would actually decide the affairs of the companies.
The news that several properties linked to Putin have been managed centrally opens up the Russian shadow economy and corruption in a rare way. A number of individual cases are beginning to appear with respect to the larger whole.
The most important question, of course, is: who will eventually pull the strings behind the secret cooperative? The OCCRP did not find a sure answer to that. Vladimir Putin’s name was still not found in the documents.
But one can, of course, ask who is the ruler in Russia who can command the usually divided and competing oligarchs to work in one inch secret cooperative.
What thoughts does the story evoke? You can discuss the topic on June 21. until 11 p.m.