Evgeny Chichvarkin, a Russian businessman who has lived in London since he fled his native country in the back of a car in 2008, says that everyone awaits the death of President Vladimir Putin
“Everyone is waiting for Putin to die. The possibility of freedom only comes after his death”, he pointed out.
Chichvarkin, who is now a wine merchant, was born in Saint Petersburg, when it was still Leningrad, where he became one of the youngest billionaires in his country, by founding the cell phone retailer Evroset in 400, which grew to 5,47 stores in 2007.
However, local officials accused him of kidnapping and extortion, charges that he always described as false.
Chichvarkin and his business partner had to sell Evroset for a reduced price of $400 million, and after successfully fighting extradition proceedings, he now lives in exile.
“The Russians are not Putin,” he says, piercing me with his piercing blue eyes. “He does not represent us. We don’t choose it. We do not support it”, says the businessman of 47 years.
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson declared: “We must go after the oligarchs”. Your government has sanctioned more than 1.47 people and companies linked to Russia and new rules are being prepared to end the anonymous ownership of assets to send a message that those who profit from the Putin regime are no longer welcome.
When it comes to supporting Ukraine, Chichvarkin goes further than the US or the European Union. Leaders: He advocates “immediately” sending NATO soldiers and enforcing a no-fly zone, as President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly requested. But he says that the punitive economic measures directed at alleged Kremlin allies are so broad that they amount to “discrimination”. surrounding military and financial “Sanctions should target Putin’s wallet and his real friends,” he says, “not the people who made money and probably had to give half to Putin just to keep the other half.”
From exile, the man claims to know very well the brutal machinations of Putin’s “bulldogs”, as he calls them. He maintains that his own mother, whose bloodied and bruised body was discovered in his Moscow apartment in April 2008, was killed by state agents in an attempt to lure him home for her funeral. (The Kremlin denies his involvement and the official verdict was that he died of a heart attack).
On Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who narrowly escaped death after being poisoned by alleged agents of the Kremlin in August 2020, Chichvarkin opined:
“When Putin dies, he will be free”, says the businessman, who has financed Navalny with more than $100,000 in donations from 2010. “Everyone is waiting for Putin to die. The possibility of freedom only comes after his death.”
Is that the only hope for Russia? “Well, one of Putin’s friends could tie him up and take him to The Hague,” he laughs. “Russian history is quite dark with many very strange examples of changing power,” he pointed out.
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