The first head of Russia’s customs service turned out to be a multimillionaire in U.S. dollars Anatoly Kruglov, who headed the State Customs Committee in the 1990s, won a ruling in a London court ordering the repayment of loans worth tens of millions of dollars Read in full
3. The individual whose interests are involved on the other side of the material transactions that took place with Mr Tchigirinski and his companies is Mr Anatoly Kruglov. Between 1991 and 1998, Mr Kruglov was head of the Russian Federation's State Customs Committee, and his family was involved in the ownership of a number of Russian customs terminals (which were privately owned, subject to state supervision). As head of the family, Mr Kruglov assumed responsibility for management of the family's money. By 1999, that money amounted to a very substantial fund, although there is no suggestion that Mr Kruglov and his family were wealthy on the scale of Mr Tchigirinski. Neither the question whether that fund all belonged beneficially to Mr Kruglov or was partly the property of his children, nor the source of the money, is relevant to the issues in these proceedings, and I shall refer to the fund simply as "the Kruglov money". What is very relevant is that Mr Kruglov also engaged Mr Haener, starting around mid-1999, to invest and manage the Kruglov money. Mr Haener carried out that task with the benefit of various powers of attorney granted to him. Initially, the Kruglov money was transferred to be held by some Liechtenstein foundations, but they were dissolved in 2006. 4. A curious but significant feature of this case is that not only was there no direct contact at any time between Mr Kruglov and Mr Tchigirinski, but that each was unaware, until well after the material events had occurred, of the involvement of the other in the various transactions concerning their respective interests. Indeed, Mr Kruglov said that although in general he was not concerned how Mr Haener invested the Kruglov money (provided that it was secure and obtained a good return), if he had known that his money was being lent, directly or indirectly, to Mr Tchigirinski he would never have agreed to that. http://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?doc=/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2012/3464.html&query=Kruglov&method=boolean#disp6 How lovely. It’s a good thing the London courts exist. Though it is a bit humiliating that crooks who siphoned off money here divide it up there so openly and brazenly, without the slightest embarrassment. As if to say: they’re a savage people, why bother looking back at them. Give them some vodka and a balalaika. Still, better this than nothing. I’m curious: they opened a case against Razvozzhayev because he allegedly took 500 hats from someone 15 years ago, but will these exposed and documentarily proven facts of corruption have any consequences at all for Kruglov? What do you think?