"Putin's wallets" with assets worth $24 billion - OCCRP investigation Published: October 25, 2017
Russian President Vladimir Putin's so-called inner circle is worth approximately $24 billion, according to the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP). This journalistic organization became famous in 2016 for its investigation of the Panama Papers.
As journalists from the center write, the business of people from Putin’s “inner circle” is connected either with large oil and gas state companies or with other state corporations: “The common feature of all these success stories is a connection with the president.”
Watch other news stories from this issue on the “Current Time” channel https://goo.gl/uPnC2S
“The Corruption Research Center linked $24 billion to Putin” https://www.znak.com/2017-10-25/centr_issledovaniya_korrupcii_svyazal_s_putinym_24_milliarda_dollarov?utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fzen.yandex.com
“The annual OCCRP Anti-Award is awarded by an international organization of investigative journalists in the field of corruption.
Vladimir Putin has been named Person of the Year by OCCRP, an international organization of investigative reporters based in Sarajevo. Each year, this dubious honor is awarded to the politician who has made the greatest contribution to “enabling and stimulating organized criminal activity,” the organization notes in a press release. The creators of the anti-award especially note “Putin’s merits in turning Russia into a major center for laundering illegal money, the involvement of organized crime in the Donbass region and Crimea, his impeccable reputation in not punishing criminal offenses, improving state policy in the field of using criminal groups that have become part of it.” part."
Drew Sullivan, editor of OCCRP, recalls that Vladimir Putin has been a finalist in the competition since its inception and may well qualify for the award for his long-term services to the development of corruption. “He was a true innovator in dealing with organized crime, creating a military-industrial politico-criminal complex that furthered his personal interests. I think that Putin is convinced that Russia’s interests and his interests are one and the same,” says the head of OCCRP.
“Vladimir Putin and his security forces, imbued with a Cold War mentality, have taken transnational organized crime to a new level,” says Pavel Radu, executive director of OCCRP. “By exploiting the lack of transparency in global finance and the offshore company system, new criminal financial infrastructures have been created and used by criminal groups in countries as far away as Mexico and Vietnam,” he recalls.
Putin was named “person of the year” based on a survey of 125 investigative reporters and experts from 20 organizations from Europe and Central Asia. “The Russian president’s rivals in the fight for the anti-prize this year were Prime Minister of Hungary Viktor Orban and Prime Minister of Montenegro Milo Djukanovic. In 2012, the winner of the OCCRP anti-award was the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, and in 2013 the Parliament of Romania" https://www.golos-ameriki.ru/a/panov-ron-putin-award/2580640.html
“It can’t be: I don’t believe it!
This is libel, slander!
Santa Claus appearing at night?
He told me: during sleep!
And then - he laughed!
It's so wild - I laughed!
And winking – with an eye?
Near the Christmas tree - he was jumping!
“Everything that is secret will become obvious!
The night passes, the light dawns!
Nobody will hide anything!
Everyone for everything - they will give an answer!”
“All their accounts will be confiscated!”
Santa Claus said in a dream!
And then - he farted loudly!
And from sleep to outside: he escaped!
Cal dejected: what do you say?
Did you believe it or not?
Such slander - terrible?
Grunt, bark - give: answer?
“Power comes from God” - you know, right?
In your holy Rus'?
Is that what they told you for 1000 years?
Devils in robes, or priests?
Today, according to an investigation by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), President Vladimir Putin had $2 billion in Panamanian offshore companies. The holder of Putin's money was Sergei Roldugin, his childhood friend and godfather of his daughter Maria. Offshore money was spent on palaces, yachts, ski resorts and other assets.
Information about the assets that Mr. Roldugin held for the Russian elite was revealed thanks to the leak of 11.5 million documents from the registrar company Mossak Fonseca (MF), the fourth largest among offshore registrars. The documents were obtained by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and provided to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).
Offshore companies associated with Roldugin were registered in 2006-2009, and existed until 2014-2015. Money appeared in offshore accounts through shady schemes, likely indicating direct theft of funds from state-owned companies. For example, in 2010, the IMO company owned by Roldugin was supposed to conclude a deal to purchase Rosneft shares from another offshore structure, but the deal “fell through” and Roldugin’s company immediately received compensation for breaking the contract - 750 thousand dollars (similar schemes were used before and high-ranking swindlers involved in the Magnitsky case). Sometimes other gray schemes were used: companies registered to Roldugin bought shares and immediately sold them back to the same companies, but at a much higher price.
Another source of money in Putin’s offshores is “donations from businessmen.” Businessman Sergei Kolesnikov, once close to the Kremlin, had previously spoken about these schemes, explaining that Russian oligarchs made donations to the president’s friends, and 35% of this money ended up in offshore accounts. OCCRP was able to find such “donations.” Among them, funds were transferred to Putin's offshore companies from structures close to steel magnate Alexei Mordashev, Putin's friend in judo, oligarch Arkady Rotenberg (a champion in winning government contracts), businessman and senator Suleiman Kerimov,
Also among those who transferred funds to Putin’s offshore companies was the Ove Group, which is associated with Mikhail Lesin, who recently died under unclear circumstances.
Finally, the third source of replenishment of Putin’s offshore funds were strange bank loans without any collateral, issued by the Cypriot RCB Bank, controlled by the state-owned VTB.
The fact that Roldugin kept Putin’s money in his offshore accounts is confirmed by what it was spent on. Here are some of the most significant expenses:
— A plot of land in the Priozersky district of the Leningrad region. The Igora ski resort is located on this site. According to Reuters, the wedding of the president's daughter took place in this place in February 2013.
— Yacht club on the shores of Lake Ladoga (where Vladimir Putin likes to relax, including on a yacht)
— “Dacha Winter” is a premium hotel on Lake Ladoga, which the media have long written about as one of Putin’s supposed palaces.
It is noteworthy that all three of these assets are in one way or another connected with another old friend of Putin, Yuri Kovalchuk.
Offshore companies associated with Sergei Roldugin also controlled shares in the country's largest enterprises. Among them are the Video International company, which controls the entire television advertising market, and the auto giant Kamaz.
Among the Mossak Fronseca documents that surfaced (covering the period from 1977 to the end of 2015) were traces of other scandalous stories. In particular, the documents refer to offshore companies of the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan, as well as the king of Saudi Arabia and the children of the president of Azerbaijan. They also contain data on at least 33 individuals and legal entities from the US government's blacklist, included there for cooperation with Mexican drug lords, terrorist organizations and countries such as the DPRK and Iran.
Among the offshore companies that have surfaced, there are also those owned by Russian officials. One of them first belonged to the son of the Minister of Economic Development, Alexey Ulyukaev (who was only 21 years old at that time), and then was transferred to Yulia Khryapina (according to investigators, she is Alexey Ulyukaev’s wife).
An offshore company was also discovered in the family of Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov. The application for registration of the company indicates the beneficiary - “professional figure skater” Tatyana Navka (moreover, the offshore registration took place back in 2014, before the wedding of Navka and Peskov, but after the ban on the ownership of offshore companies for officials). From the same application it follows that the company can purchase investment assets in the interests of the beneficiary and manage assets worth more than $1 million. Navka herself denies ownership of any offshore companies.
The wife of the notorious governor Andrei Turchak also turned out to be the owner of an offshore company: from 2008 to 2015, she was the sole shareholder of Burtford Unicorp Inc in the Virgin Islands, although the ban on the ownership of foreign assets came into force in 2013. And in 2014, another offshore was owned by the Governor of the Chelyabinsk Region, Boris Dubrovsky - this was also a violation of the law.
Deputy Mayor of Moscow Maxim Liksutov was the beneficiary of as many as three offshore companies, although he sold them before the law prohibiting this ownership came into force.
Friday, 01 April 2016, 10:14The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) has published the full text of its investigation, containing .
The Russian translation of the article is posted on the OCCRP website.
“OCCRP explained that the main investigation was carried out by their center, which then transferred part of the information to Reuters. The authors of the investigation repeatedly tried to contact Mr. Baevsky, but they were never successful. The persons involved in the published investigation did not comment on it on Thursday. A representative of Mr. Rotenberg said that the businessman does not have information about real estate transactions of Grigory Baevsky and that he does not work “in any of the companies or structures of Arkady Rotenberg,” they write in the Kommersant publication, commenting on the publication. They note that Alisa Kharcheva, according to According to journalists, she is now in Africa. “Earlier, she told Reuters that she does not know Mr. Baevsky, she bought the house with a mortgage and is still paying it off,” the publication adds.
Here is the full text of the investigation according to OCCRP. The publication is called " Russia: businessman manages houses of close associates".
“A mysterious Russian businessman, formerly the head of a state property management company, bought apartments in Moscow and the Moscow region for a number of women from the entourage of Russian President Vladimir Putin, including his daughter, Alina Kabaeva; and a girl who published a playful message online in her blog “Pussy for Putin” (translated as “Kitty for Putin”), in which she gives the Russian leader a kitten and praises his talent as a leader.
Grigory Bayevsky, 47, worked for Arkady Rotenberg, a well-connected man in the Kremlin and a longtime friend and sparring partner of Putin in judo. According to the documents, Baevsky not only helped Putin resolve several very personal and sensitive issues, but also made a fortune from dubious transactions with the state.
Photo from the blog of student Alisa Kharcheva offering Putin a kitten
Cover for family
Putin has always tried to build an impenetrable wall around his family to protect them from the scrutiny directed at him and from the risks associated with his professional activities. So, despite speculation about the past of Putin’s children expressed by the world media over the past few years, the Kremlin has never confirmed their identities.
But last year the first cracks appeared in the impenetrable wall when Ekaterina Tikhonova, a young and then unknown woman, suddenly took charge of a prestigious and ambitious project to expand the territory of Moscow State University (MSU). The project budget is estimated at 110 billion rubles. ($1.7 billion). Investigations by Russian daily RBC, Reuters and OCCRP confirm that Tikhonova is indeed the Russian leader's youngest daughter.
Much of Tikhonova’s research at the university was funded by Russia’s largest state-owned companies, led by Putin’s closest supporters.
One of Russia's best-kept secrets is where Putin's family lives. This information is rarely indicated even in official documents. Nevertheless, in 2012, when creating a company related to her work, Tikhonova indicated her official address. OCCRP was able to verify the address provided. Officially, Tikhonova lives in a modest one-room apartment in the Moscow region, not far from Novo-Ogaryovo, where her father usually lives and works. Due to security concerns, OCCRP is not publishing the address of Tikhonova's apartment.
Since 2007, the owner of the apartment in which Tikhonova is registered is Baevsky, until recently a little-known businessman from St. Petersburg.
In the mid-2000s, Baevsky headed the Directorate for Investment Activities (DIA), a state enterprise within the Federal Agency for State Property Management (Rosimushchestvo).
The main function of the BIT is the effective management of state property. Therefore, after leaving his position at the Foreign Foreign Ministry in 2009, Baevsky did not even have to retrain: he moved from managing state property to managing the private property of people from Putin’s entourage.
Connections with Putin
According to information from open sources, even during his service in the Foreign Relations Department, Baevsky was already closely associated with Arkady Rotenberg, one of Putin’s longtime friends. Rotenberg is among the individuals subject to personal sanctions by the United States and the European Union (EU) in connection with the crisis in eastern Ukraine.
According to the Council of the European Union, Rotenberg prospered under Putin's patronage.
"He made his fortune during Putin's reign. Russian decision-makers and executives gave him preference when concluding important contracts with the Government of the Russian Federation or with state-owned companies. His companies received several extremely profitable contracts in preparation for the Olympic Games in Sochi," the statement said. Council of the EU.
In its ranking “Kings of Government Contracts – 2016,” the Russian edition of Forbes magazine gave Rotenberg first place, citing more than half a trillion rubles (US $7.4 billion) as the amount of government contracts he received. Many, if not most, of the contracts received by Rotenberg's companies were awarded to them without competition.
Baevsky has been associated with Rotenberg for a long time. In 2004, Baevsky re-decorated an extremely expensive apartment in the center of Moscow, on Bolshaya Ordynka, for Rotenberg’s daughter Lilia. Since 2006, Baevsky, together with Arkady Rotenberg and his brother Boris, are the founders of the dacha cooperative "Fatherland", located near St. Petersburg.
After leaving DID, Baevsky joined Rotenberg’s business activities: he was included in the official list of affiliates of SMP Bank, controlled by the Rotenberg brothers. From 2011 to 2014, Baevsky was also the general director of the Russian Holding Company (RHC), of which Rotenberg is a beneficiary.
RHC owns a number of valuable Russian assets, including being one of the shareholders of the National Chemical Group (NHG), one of the largest players in the Russian mineral fertilizer market. RHC is also involved in a $6 billion project to build a highway from the borders of Belarus to Kazakhstan, which could become part of the so-called new “Silk Road” - a fast land route between Western Europe and China.
Live large
Baevsky is not just a hired employee. He also developed his own business, and, as in the case of Arkady Rotenberg, Baevsky’s company received most of its income from Russian taxpayers’ money. According to OCCRP estimates, Baevsky's companies have won government tenders worth more than 6 billion rubles ($88 million at current exchange rates) over the past two years.
The largest contract of 2.7 billion rubles ($82 million) was received by Baevsky in 2013 to prepare the area for the construction of a ring road around St. Petersburg (signed on June 21, 2013).
Baevsky likes to spend the money he receives from Russian taxpayers on luxury items. He owns a string of properties worth millions of dollars, from St. Petersburg to Moscow and Gelendzhik in southern Russia, near Sochi, where the so-called “Putin Palace” is located. His apartment in one of the most expensive areas of Moscow, on Prechistinka, is estimated at no less than 50 million rubles ($740,000). Baevsky also owns the glamorous 65-meter superyacht Rahil, built in 2011 by the Italian shipbuilding company Benetti. Rahil, previously sailing under the name Nataly, won the prestigious Nautical Design Award in 2011 as the best motor yacht (in the category of vessels over 40 meters).
Photo occrp.org
Ladies from the inner circle
Tikhonova is not the only woman from Putin’s circle with real estate ties to Baevsky. According to the real estate register, in 2009 Baevsky refurbished the apartment with an area of 228 square meters. m. on the street Veresaeva in Moscow in the name of Leysan Kabaeva, sister of Alina Kabaeva.
Alina Kabaeva is an Olympic champion in rhythmic gymnastics and chairman of the board of directors of the National Media Group, one of the largest media holdings in Russia. The holding is controlled by Putin's longtime friend Yuri Kovalchuk. Over the years, Kabaeva has been called Putin's "sweetheart," but Putin has sharply denied such speculation, as well as other attempts to ferret out details of his personal life. These rumors were never confirmed.
In 2013, Baevsky re-registered a plot of land and a house located in the prestigious village of Uspenskoye in the Odintsovo district of the Moscow region in the name of 81-year-old pensioner Anna Zatsepina. Uspenskoye is one of the most expensive areas of Russia: one hundred square meters of land here can cost about $100,000. This village is popular among the richest Russians: oligarchs, high-ranking officials and celebrities. Uspenskoye is located just a 15-minute drive from Putin’s official residence in Novo-Ogaryovo.
An elderly woman named Anna Zatsepina was mentioned in a documentary about Alina Kabaeva produced by the Russian state-run Channel One in 2013, as well as in a number of media reports from the 2014 Sochi Olympics. Anna Zatsepina is the grandmother of Alina Kabaeva.
State real estate records do not include transaction details, so OCCRP was unable to determine whether the properties were sold to their current owners or simply donated.
Kitties
Baevsky owned several apartments, but most of them were transferred or sold to people allegedly close to Putin. But one apartment went to a girl who was not so directly related to the President of Russia. In 2015, 23-year-old Alisa Kharcheva received from Baevsky an apartment and an underground parking space in a building on Minskaya Street.
In 2010, Kharcheva, who had just graduated from school at that time, became the “April Girl” in an erotic calendar dedicated to Putin’s birthday. Later, Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov admitted that the Russian leader liked the calendar. “The girls are cute,” Peskov said.
After the publication of the calendar, Kharcheva became a student at the Faculty of Journalism at the Moscow State University of International Relations. In 2012, she sent another birthday greeting to the Russian President. On her blog, Alisa published an entry with the title “Pussy for Putin” (“Kitty for Putin”). As illustrations, Alice uses photographs of herself in which she poses in playful poses, with a photograph of Putin and a cat, which, according to her, is a gift for the president.
“I believe that he (Putin) is a gorgeous man, a strong leader and an ideal leader of the country... I found a wonderful cat as a gift for the president. I believe that she will bring Putin only good luck... Until Vladimir Vladimirovich wants pick up your gift, the cat will live with me,” Kharcheva wrote.
In response to questions from an OCCRP journalist, Kharcheva said that she bought the apartment from Baevsky through a real estate agent and that she did not know Baevsky personally.
When asked if she was in any way connected with Putin and if the apartment was given to her, she laughed and said: “Stupidity... Of course not. Everyone has long forgotten about that calendar.”
The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) is an international journalism project that brings together 40 non-profit investigative centers, dozens of journalists and a number of major regional news organizations around the world. The geography of the project covers the countries of Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America. OCCRP emerged as a journalistic association in 2006 to conduct cross-border investigative journalism, develop and disseminate high-tech methods for detecting corruption and organized crime in different parts of the world.
OUR MISSION
OCCRP's mission is to help people around the world understand how corruption and organized crime operate in their states, including government structures. OCCRP is a non-national organization: we do not represent any country, ideology or value system. Our editors and journalists are citizens of dozens of countries. We are driven only by the belief that all people should have the right to freely choose their own government, as well as the right to security, freedom and equal opportunity.
Our world is becoming more and more multipolar, and the world media broadcast a huge volume of propaganda, incomplete or outright distorted information. At the same time, we all have a responsibility to strive to understand exactly how our increasingly complex societies function. We must have the chance to hear the truth in order to be able to make the necessary and correct decisions. Despite our limited capabilities, OCCRP always strives to provide the most accurate information possible.
Without any fanfare, OCCRP has grown into one of the world's largest networks of investigative journalists. Every year we create and publish more than six dozen international investigative reports. More than six million people visit our site every month, and about two hundred million more people access our materials through publications and broadcasts in traditional media. The growing practical impact of OCCRP's publications proves that when enough people have the right information, they can make the necessary changes happen.
OCCRP also provides training in the latest methods of journalism, and in addition, creates convenient, highly effective electronic resources for optimal collection of information and more accurate preparation and publication of materials. It's safe to say that OCCRP is redefining investigative journalism, making it more interactive, actionable, influential, and more relevant to the public.
OCCRP RESULTS
All our activities are focused on achieving the goals that form the basis of our mission; in a nutshell, it's about developing investigative journalism and making a difference in people's lives. OCCRP is one of the most effective news organizations in delivering real results. Since 2009, our publications have resulted in: Confiscation or seizure by law enforcement of more than $5.7 billion in assets.
- 84 criminal investigations, including official audits, started after the publication of our materials.
- 81 official statements with calls to action from government agencies, international organizations and civil society structures.
- Issue of 147 arrest warrants, including against seven persons on the run.
- 20 high-profile dismissals and resignations, including one president, one prime minister, and managers transnational corporations.
- Over 1,400 legal decisions, including business closures, formal charges, and court orders.
These results speak to the colossal effectiveness of OCCRP's work given the organization's modest budget. Therefore, for financial donors, investing in OCCRP is one of the best investments in terms of return. If we turn to the financial side, over the entire period of activity, the “income” on investments in OCCRP amounted to almost 60 thousand percent for governments around the world, if we count confiscated assets and fines. This is a success that may have no precedent.
News organizations in developing countries, recognizing OCCRP's achievements, seek to consult with us, attend our training, and generally develop relationships with us. This, in turn, helps expand interaction between our network's journalism hubs well beyond national borders, allowing them to conduct the “international side” of their work more effectively.
WHO SUPPORTS US
OCCRP receives grant support from organizations such as the Open Society Institute, Google Digital News Initiative, Skoll Foundation, Sigrid Rausing Foundation, Google Jigsaw, the National Endowment for Democracy, and the Knight Brothers Foundation. To address issues related to the development of journalism, OCCRP also receives funds from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through the International Center for the Support of Journalists (ICFJ), as well as from the US State Department and the Swiss Confederation.
OCCRP also features investigative journalism and projects produced with funding or partnerships with other organizations such as the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), Stockholm School of Economics, In Sight, Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ), Connectas, African Network of Centers for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR).
OCCRP is the official name of the Journalism Development Network, a registered 501(c)3 charitable organization in Maryland.
CURRENT PROJECTS AND PROGRAMS
In addition to publishing investigative reports and daily news stories, OCCRP regularly conducts a variety of projects and programs. Training and professional empowerment One of OCCRP's core activities is to help build professional capacity and teach journalistic standards and other skills, including the personal safety of journalists. Together with the Riga branch of the Stockholm School of Economics, we offer a variety of educational courses, including training in investigative journalism best practices, as well as journalism management and safety practices.
OCCRP provides specialized training and consulting services to partner organizations such as ARIJ, Connectas, and members of the Center's journalism network. The goal is to build a financially stable and professionally successful community of investigative journalists from different countries.
The professional knowledge and experience of our journalists and editors are in great demand around the world. Every year they are invited to participate in more than 50 events as experts and leading educational programs in various parts of the world - from Iceland to Brazil.
Such authority of OCCRP in the world became possible solely due to the conscientious performance of journalistic duties. The Panama Papers project, implemented in partnership with the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, had the widest international resonance. The work of our journalists on the YanukovychLeaks project also aroused great interest in the world. Then they discovered, restored and posted on the Internet documents thrown into a pond near the residence of ex-President of Ukraine Yanukovych during his flight from the country.
Mention should be made here of the top-class professionals from our technical service, who train journalists in the rules of protecting information and communication channels, providing them with a “technical advantage” over criminals and repressive authorities.
Analytics and research OCCRP members work closely with journalists from the world's media to prepare individual articles and projects. At the same time, they provide colleagues with access to the information they need through our analytical and search resources. We cooperate with journalists from Africa, the Middle East, South and Central America, the Pacific region and North America, as well as with dozens of media outlets in Europe and the former Soviet Union.
OCCRP has developed effective online resources for journalists, including the searchable Investigative Dashboard (ID). Through a simple web interface, ID connects journalists around the world with OCCRP staff collecting and analyzing investigative information.
We conceived ID as a global electronic platform for interaction and assistance with journalists and analysts representing civil society. The ID contains three key elements: a crowdsourced database of information and documents about “persons of interest” and their business connections, a list of databases and business registries around the world, and a “search service” where journalists can turn to find hard-to-find information.
In the structure of the ID platform, in 2016 our IT specialists also created (ID Search) - a search mechanism for a database collected from documents from open sources from around the world. Our technical department regularly updates the database with public data, such as court materials, information about property owners, leaked documents, government reports, income and property declarations of officials, data on the financing of parties and politicians, and much more. Technical developments OCCRP employs more than half a dozen programmers and IT systems specialists who help our network members and our partners develop new technology tools, set up computer infrastructure, and solve research and analytical problems.
OCCRP's technology team works directly with journalists to ensure they are up to date with the latest techniques and make the most of technology for investigative purposes. Thus, our specialists helped participants in the YanukovychLeaks project digitize thousands of water-damaged documents that the former head of Ukraine Yanukovych wanted to destroy. Technical support and information security In addition to developing electronic tools and resources for journalists, OCCRP's technology team provides information security personnel, maintaining technical infrastructure, and fending off computer attacks against our partners. Our technical department also designs pages for the OCCRP website, including project pages, and helps the center's partners protect their sources using various tools and applications, such as the portal. This resource allows sources to securely transmit text information and documents to us. Technological tools Our technical staff also works with OCCRP partner centers to develop tools for the optimal functioning of their sites and content on them. We are talking, in particular, about the functionality of mobile data publishing and the information aggregation system, which is currently being developed.
In addition, OCCRP has created a data visualization platform (VIS - Visual Investigative Scenarios). Its mission is to help investigative journalists, civil activists and other interested parties transform individual elements of sometimes complex commercial or criminal structures into visual diagrams. Mind Maps provides professionally designed, customizable dynamic HTML5 visualization templates for displaying composite structures, networks, and complexly configured data.
WE ARE ESTABLISHING NEW PRINCIPLES FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM
As the world enters a golden age of whistleblowing, OCCRP is pioneering new ways to use technology to more effectively find and consolidate the world's information on the activities of corrupt officials and criminals. We publish more than 60 investigative reports a year (more than any other news organization in the world) and have become a source of meaningful change in our society. We are reforming the principles of investigative journalism to strengthen the social and political impact of journalism, provide greater real value to readers, improve interactivity in the handling of information, improve the efficiency of research and analytical work, ensure the safety of journalists and better protect our sources of information.
OCCRP is trying to think in a revolutionary way to make investigative journalism more effective in an increasingly collaborative profession across borders.
At the same time, it is important to remember that the creators of OCCRP's success are the center's employees: journalists, editors, fact checkers, analysts, IT specialists - thanks to them OCCRP conducts its activities. We are nurturing the next generation of investigative journalists and will continue to fully develop the profession into the future.
“The world is changing at a breakneck pace, and investigative journalism must change, not just to meet new challenges and needs, but to anticipate the future in order to remain relevant and relevant. And OCCRP is committed to helping us all get there." - Drew Sullivan, OCCRP Editor-in-Chief
The OCCRP Person of the Year award is awarded annually to politicians who, as stated in the statutes for this title, “have made the greatest contribution to enabling and stimulating organized crime.” In particular, the creators of the anti-award especially noted “the unsurpassed services of Russian President Vladimir Putin in turning his country into the world’s largest center for laundering criminal money, including all organized crime in the Ukrainian Crimea and Donbass, as well as an impeccable reputation in ensuring impunity for corruption crimes and transformation of organized criminal groups into an integral part of the state system."
Head of OCCRP Drew Sullivan, who announced the award of the anti-prize for 2014, reminded reporters that Vladimir Putin had been waiting for this dubious award for quite a long time: he became a finalist for several years in a row. In the end, the long-deserved anti-reward found its anti-hero.
- Putin has become a real innovator in the work of the state against organized crime,- Drew Sullivan emphasized. - He managed to create both a political-criminal and a military-industrial complex that worked entirely for his personal interests. I believe that Putin is absolutely convinced that his personal interests and the interests of Russia are in fact one and the same.
In turn, OCCRP Executive Director Pavel Radu drew attention to Vladimir Putin’s extensive connections in the world of transnational organized crime.
- The Russian president and the leaders of his security forces, who successfully absorbed the Cold War style of thinking, took transnational organized crime to virtually a completely new level,- noted Pavel Radu. “Moreover, they were able to successfully use the existing opacity of global financial flows to create completely new financial infrastructures, which are used in their activities by numerous criminal groups in Mexico and Vietnam.
The recognition of Vladimir Putin as the world's top corrupt official in 2014 according to OCCRP took place after a traditional survey of 125 journalists from around the world working on the topic of organized crime and corruption, as well as experts from 20 anti-corruption organizations from Europe and Asia. The Russian president's main rivals were the Hungarian prime minister Victor Orban, marked by a series of corruption scandals, and the head of the government of Montenegro Milo Djukanovic, repeatedly accused of financial ties to the criminal world. It is interesting that in the previous year, 2013, the “anti-premium” became collective - it was received by the full deputies of the Romanian Parliament. And the “award” for 2012 went to the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev.
We need to get rid of such a President.
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