As children they were the Putina sisters, as adults they became Maria Vorontsova and Katerina Tikhonova. And this Friday April 8, after the United States and the European Union, it is the turn of the United Kingdom to adopt Sanctions against them, freezing their assets and prohibiting them from entering British soil. So why pick on these two women with no public existence or political influence?
Maria was born in 1985 in St. Petersburg, Katerina a year later in Dresden, from the union of Vladimir Poutine and Lioudmila Ocheretnaya, wife for thirty years of the President of the Russian Federation. Putin therefore founded a family when he was a spy for the KGB, particularly in East Germany, which explains the birthplace of his second daughter. Both studied mainly in Moscow and chose to practice in the scientific field, Maria as an endocrinologist, Katerina as a mathematician. And to see who they work for today, we guess the influence of the father.
The first is indeed co-owner of Nomeko, a medical company specializing in cancer research. The main investor in this company is the insurance company Sogaz, owned by Yuri Kovaltchouk, a businessman close to Putin. As for the second, after having led a fine career in acrobatic dance, since 2020 she has been at the head of an artificial intelligence institute attached to Moscow State University. Since December of the same year, it has joined forces with the Gazprom-Media holding company to develop a social network capable of competing with TikTok.
Interests to place in their private life
If Putin therefore ensures the professional success of his daughters, he also watches over their private life as if it were his own. It must be said that it is somewhat the case. In 2013, Katerina married Kirill Shamalov, son of Nikolai Shamalov, a childhood friend of Putin and co-owner of Rossiya Bank. Putin’s son-in-law then received large shares in the Russian petrochemical company Sibur and became, at 32, the country’s youngest billionaire. And if the love story ended in divorce, Katerina got her hands on half of her ex-husband’s fortune.
Regarding Maria, no wedding with great fanfare, but a story with a Dutchman, Jorrit Faassen. One day, following a traffic accident, he was assaulted by the bodyguard of a Russian banker named Matvej Orin. The beginning of trouble for the latter, the arbitrary search of his home a few days later revealing the presence of drugs, weapons and evidence of corruption. Oerin will be sentenced to two years in prison in April 2011. We do not touch the boyfriends of Putin’s daughters.
If a wave of sanctions is now falling on Maria Vonrontsova and Katerina Tikhonova, it is therefore good to reach the father, accused of using his relatives as nominees in order to hide part of his immense fortune. “We believe a lot of Putin’s assets are hidden through his family members, and that’s why we’re targeting them,” a senior US official said.
An untraceable mistress…
Another woman in the viewfinder, Alina Kabaeva, a Russian gymnast presented as being the mistress of the president. The Kremlin’s most famous opponent, Alexei Navalny, claimed in January 2021 that Kabaeva enjoyed a highly paid position on the board of directors of the public television group National Media Group, offered by the oligarch Yuri Kovalchuk, decidedly protective of the his friend’s wives.
Taking advantage of the system, it could logically be subject to sanctions. But for that, it will be necessary to locate her, because if several sources agree that she resides in Switzerland, the federal government is struggling to find her. After a hunt for oligarchs unsuccessful, Western countries hope to falter the master of the Kremlin by affecting his loved ones.