The European Union is discussing the possibility of imposing sanctions on some wealthy Russians and executives of Russian companies in connection with the military operation in Ukraine, as per Bloomberg.
The list of individuals, including Alisher Usmanov, Mikhail Fridman, Alfa Bank Chairman Petr Aven, and Severstal’s main owner Alexei Mordashov, has not yet been finalized and may change, according to Bloomberg.
According to the VCK-OGPU telegram channel, sanctions are expected to be imposed on Usmanov, who is reportedly currently residing in a castle near Munich and planning to fly to Tashkent.
Despite reports of Usmanov's Burkhan liner being parked in Munich, it is suggested that the oligarch may already be in his luxurious palace in Uzbekistan.
Today, we revisit the story of the book “Career at the Quarry” by Anatoly Timofeyevich Kalashnikov, the former director of Lebedinsky GOK, under whose leadership the plant grew to a value of $4 billion. The book recounts how the profitable enterprise was deliberately mortgaged and its profits minimized, all through the eyes of a direct participant of the events. A real thriller.
Understandably, Usmanov’s Metalloinvest representatives immediately bought the entire print run of the book, then neutralized Kalashnikov. Media outlets, including MK, Sobesednik, and others then published interviews in which Kalashnikov praised Usmanov. Kalashnikov also revealed that a second edition of his book with changes portraying Usmanov more positively is in the works.
However, no one will condemn the 81-year-old Kalashnikov. A source well acquainted with Kalashnikov recounted his latest conversation with Usmanov, who had invited him to work at the company after reading his book and expressed a desire to help him. Kalashnikov, however, believed that the gesture was designed to deceive him.
When Metalloinvest made a deal with Kalashnikov, it put out a threatening statement vowing to prosecute the people they consider to be criminals, which are the ordinary miners who had their shares in Lebedinsky GOK forcefully taken away. The miners went to different authorities, including filing complaints to law enforcement, to seek justice, but they were warned of possible imprisonment.
The miners reacted to this statement by sending their detailed response to the editorial board and the VCK-OGPU.
As minority shareholders of JSC Lebedinsky GOK, we want to remind you of the ways in which your management acquired our people's enterprises – LGOK and OEMK. We hoped that your management would remember these schemes until now.
We also hoped that the main beneficiaries of the financial draining of the region would have some remaining conscience. It seems that our hopes were in vain!
Since you and the law enforcement agencies refer to the decisions of the Russian courts and claim that they have confirmed the legality of the seizure of our property, without acknowledging the criminal aspects of the process, we are committed to proving the criminal acts within 30 days of your press release.
We will strongly demand that those responsible for protecting our constitutional rights fulfill their duties, as we have fulfilled our part of the social contract by paying taxes.
We will not make deliberately false accusations about economic crimes or threaten to involve foreign law enforcement agencies and courts within the Russian Federation. Instead, we will only offer documents and testimonies from former participants who are US and EU citizens.
We commit to providing documents and taking all necessary actions to protect our legitimate interests via FinCEN, and we will submit all received documents to non-corrupt law enforcement agencies within a week.
We request to know who exactly issued your statement/press release on behalf of Lebedinsky GOK. No one working at LebGOK will endorse such a cowardly lie directed at us. Our fellow countrymen work there and are constantly being dismissed by your efficient managers, receiving low pay for hard, harmful, and hazardous labor. Under Anatoly Timofeyevich Kalashnikov, the miners in the quarry received a salary of $6-7 thousand, which allowed them to afford medical treatment in oncological dispensaries in Belgorod, as well as in Germany and Israel.
There is no such person – Lebedinsky GOK! You lie, Anton Troshin, Grigory Levenko and Valera Bitayev, just as brazenly as your superiors. And you personally, too, will have to answer for lying and manipulation with a threatening context. And Lebedinsky GOK, without a signature, in the form in which you and we have presented it here, probably already soon will go to the social distance, like Alisher Burkhanovitch! For two – three months. And then for sure there will be real signatures under the pseudonym “Lebedinsky GOK”! We will collect thousands of signatures. We promise you!
Miners and metallurgists
Let us briefly explain what we are talking about.
After Usmanov had taken over the plant, some of the shares were held by the ordinary miners and mine employees. Now, they claim they lost their shares in a forced buyout carried out by Usmanov’s companies at prices very far from market prices.
The appraisal was carried out by Gorislavtsev & Co. Valuation, which based its valuation on the fact that the official proceeds of the mine were less than $1 billion. However, according to the applicants, in reality the revenues were understated by at least three times. The products were sold at reduced prices to Usmanov’s offshore companies (BGMT and FMC Ltd.), and then they were sold at market prices. As a result, the GOK’s actual proceeds amounted to at least $3 billion.
Metalloinvest considered the miners’ attempt to obtain justice and their appeals to Russian law enforcement authorities as “blackmail and extortion.
