1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:07,080 In August 2020, on the order of Vladimir Putin, Navalny was poisoned with “Novichok” chemical warfare agent 2 00:00:07,080 --> 00:00:10,360 He survived, came back to Russia and was arrested right at the airport. 3 00:00:10,360 --> 00:00:15,440 On August 18, 2021, the court unlawfully arrested Alexey Navalny and sent him to “Matrosskaya Tishina” prison 4 00:00:15,440 --> 00:00:23,040 For many years, navalny has been fighting for our rights. Now it’s our time to fight for him. 5 00:00:23,040 --> 00:00:27,120 January 23, 14:00. Central streets of your cities. Take to the streets. Don’t stand aside. 6 00:00:27,120 --> 00:00:28,220 Hi, it’s Navalny. 7 00:00:28,220 --> 00:00:32,840 We came up with this investigation when I was in intensive care, but we immediately agreed 8 00:00:32,840 --> 00:00:37,160 that we would release it when I returned home, to Russia, to Moscow, 9 00:00:37,160 --> 00:00:41,540 because we do not want the main character of this film to think 10 00:00:41,540 --> 00:00:47,200 that we are afraid of him and that I will tell about his worst secret while abroad. 11 00:00:47,200 --> 00:00:50,400 One of these viewers is the most devoted admirer of our work, 12 00:00:50,400 --> 00:00:53,120 on whose orders I was poisoned, is Vladimir Putin. 13 00:00:53,120 --> 00:00:57,860 He is definitely watching this now, and his heart is filling with nostalgia. 14 00:00:57,860 --> 00:01:02,780 This is not only an investigation, but also, in a sense, a psychological portrait. 15 00:01:02,780 --> 00:01:07,400 I really want to understand how an ordinary Soviet officer turned into a madman 16 00:01:07,400 --> 00:01:11,840 who is obsessed with money and luxury and literally ready 17 00:01:11,840 --> 00:01:15,960 to destroy the country and kill for the sake of his chests of gold. 18 00:01:15,960 --> 00:01:20,920 That’s why this is a very symbolic place to start our film. 19 00:01:31,260 --> 00:01:36,360 I am in Dresden, and this inconspicuous panel building is where first corruption schemes 20 00:01:36,360 --> 00:01:40,160 were drawn by those who would later arrange the biggest robbery in the history of Russia. 21 00:01:40,160 --> 00:01:42,520 They will simply steal all the national wealth. 22 00:01:42,520 --> 00:01:48,220 Their leader, 33-year-old Volodya Putin, the future richest man in the world, lived here. 23 00:01:48,220 --> 00:01:51,000 In those days, everything was simple and the level of his atrocities 24 00:01:51,000 --> 00:01:53,560 roughly corresponded to the level of this building. 25 00:01:53,560 --> 00:01:57,340 Vladimir Vladimirovich was occupied with how, using his official position, 26 00:01:57,340 --> 00:01:59,820 to get hold of a good imported radio tape recorder. 27 00:01:59,820 --> 00:02:03,220 But in principle, neither his methods nor his circle of proxies have changed. 28 00:02:03,220 --> 00:02:07,620 It’s just that before, they were interested in radio tape recorders, and now - in huge state enterprises. 29 00:02:07,620 --> 00:02:11,380 They sat at ceremonial events and read speeches. 30 00:02:11,380 --> 00:02:14,460 It’s just that in those days, they praised grandfather Lenin 31 00:02:14,460 --> 00:02:16,620 and swore allegiance to the ideals of communism, 32 00:02:16,620 --> 00:02:21,520 but now they cross themselves in churches and teach us spirituality and conservatism. 33 00:02:21,520 --> 00:02:25,480 Today we will see what is considered impossible to see up close. 34 00:02:25,480 --> 00:02:31,480 We will go where no one is allowed. We will pay Putin a visit and see with our own eyes 35 00:02:31,480 --> 00:02:36,320 that this man, in his craving for luxury and wealth, has gone completely mad. 36 00:02:36,320 --> 00:02:39,460 We will find out how and with whose money this luxury is financed. 37 00:02:39,460 --> 00:02:44,200 And how, over the past 15 years, the biggest bribe in history is being given 38 00:02:44,200 --> 00:02:46,760 and the most expensive palace in the world is being built. 39 00:03:15,800 --> 00:03:19,960 Palace for Putin 40 00:03:19,960 --> 00:03:27,120 Putin, a petty KGB officer who now masquerades as a great spy, came to Dresden in 1985. 41 00:03:27,120 --> 00:03:31,160 He wants us to think of him as a cool infiltrator. 42 00:03:31,160 --> 00:03:34,800 But in fact, he was an ordinary employee not even of a secret residency, 43 00:03:34,800 --> 00:03:39,940 but of the official representative office of the KGB in East Germany, a friend of the Soviet Union. 44 00:03:42,960 --> 00:03:47,360 Today's court propagandists love to romanticize that period of Putin's life, 45 00:03:47,360 --> 00:03:49,820 claiming that he infiltrated the enemy's lair. 46 00:03:49,820 --> 00:03:54,840 In fact, this building was a warm place, where a bunch of idlers like Putin 47 00:03:54,840 --> 00:03:59,920 sat at party meetings and awarded each other with mementos. Just like they do now. 48 00:03:59,920 --> 00:04:07,900 November 21, 1987. Suited-up Putin, believe it or not, at the brothers-in-arms ball. 49 00:04:07,900 --> 00:04:10,820 The event is dedicated to the friendship between the KGB and the Stasi, 50 00:04:10,820 --> 00:04:15,200 the great October revolution, and the inevitable victory of socialism throughout the world. 51 00:04:15,200 --> 00:04:18,860 On this day, Putin was presented with an award, a golden badge, 52 00:04:18,860 --> 00:04:21,880 as a symbol of friendship between Germany and the Soviet Union. 53 00:04:21,880 --> 00:04:28,720 Friendship with the Soviet Union became the need of the heart of every citizen of the GDR 54 00:04:28,720 --> 00:04:32,420 Now this “valuable” can be purchased on the Internet for 3 euros. 55 00:04:32,420 --> 00:04:36,640 Throughout the evening, Putin and his colleagues read long speeches, drank Soviet cognac, 56 00:04:36,640 --> 00:04:42,620 watched slides and trembled with pride and loyalty to the ideas of Marxism-Leninism. 57 00:04:42,620 --> 00:04:48,020 In less than two years, not a trace of all this will remain. The Berlin Wall will be destroyed. 58 00:04:48,020 --> 00:04:52,980 East Germany, along with the Stasi and KGB offices, will cease to exist. 59 00:04:52,980 --> 00:04:55,780 The system built on lies and repression collapsed, 60 00:04:55,780 --> 00:04:59,560 but left behind one very important legacy: its archives. 61 00:05:02,640 --> 00:05:08,280 Alas, despite his dreams and expectations, Putin failed to build a career or get rich in Dresden. 62 00:05:08,280 --> 00:05:13,380 But on the other hand, he met with the people who would later become his main wallets. 63 00:05:19,200 --> 00:05:25,380 I’ve now put on white gloves and am aided by David Schraven, head of Correctiv. 64 00:05:25,380 --> 00:05:31,260 Here is Putin's case file, let’s study it. 65 00:05:31,260 --> 00:05:35,460 We have already seen this photo. Vladimir Putin receives a golden badge. 66 00:05:35,460 --> 00:05:38,640 But not everyone noticed this gentleman. 67 00:05:38,640 --> 00:05:41,720 And this is none other than Sergei Viktorovich Chemezov, 68 00:05:41,720 --> 00:05:45,060 now the head of the Rostec corporation. He served alongside Putin. 69 00:05:45,060 --> 00:05:49,420 So, in this photo, we see two of the richest people in Russia. 70 00:05:49,420 --> 00:05:51,600 Well, Putin is probably the richest man in the world, 71 00:05:51,600 --> 00:05:56,040 and Chemezov is definitely one of the five richest people in our country. 72 00:05:56,040 --> 00:06:01,080 After 30 years, he is still around, but already as a billionaire civil servant. 73 00:06:01,080 --> 00:06:06,720 It's peculiar how carefully the Germans recorded everything. Typical Germans… 74 00:06:06,720 --> 00:06:10,980 Here is the program of the evening, and it is written that at 6 pm 75 00:06:10,980 --> 00:06:18,320 a special toast will be pronounced in honor of the representatives of the host country, 76 00:06:18,320 --> 00:06:24,220 and everyone will be given ein Glas sowjetischen Kognaks, a glass of Soviet cognac. 77 00:06:24,220 --> 00:06:32,380 Further on, they make all sorts of solemn speeches, praise Comrade Lenin, praise socialism, 78 00:06:32,380 --> 00:06:39,960 give each other souvenirs and, according to the program, no later than 19:45, 79 00:06:39,960 --> 00:06:44,580 Vladimir Vladimirovich begins to dance, because at 19:45 the dances start. 80 00:06:44,580 --> 00:06:50,040 We have two booklets with photographs - this one has been shown repeatedly on TV, 81 00:06:50,040 --> 00:06:55,500 you’ve seen it many times - this is a Stasi ID with the name Vladimir Putin on it. 82 00:06:55,500 --> 00:07:01,020 There is a similar ID with a picture of a very nice person on it. 83 00:07:01,020 --> 00:07:05,100 This is Nikolai Petrovich Tokarev. The man at the head of Transneft. 84 00:07:05,100 --> 00:07:10,220 He, unlike Chemezov, never confirmed his work in the KGB, and in his official biography, 85 00:07:10,220 --> 00:07:15,600 there is a 20-year gap and work in the “mining industry”. Well, we have filled this gap. 86 00:07:15,600 --> 00:07:19,080 The numbers of these IDs differ by one digit. 87 00:07:19,080 --> 00:07:24,480 Here’s another document, a Stasi phone book. It has a section "Comrades/Friends". 88 00:07:24,480 --> 00:07:29,640 Let’s study it. Look, Major Tokarev and Major Chemezov have the same phone numbers. 89 00:07:29,640 --> 00:07:33,700 That is, they literally sat in the same office, and their desks were obviously next to each other. 90 00:07:38,680 --> 00:07:42,640 It was here, in Dresden, that Putin defined his main life principles, 91 00:07:42,640 --> 00:07:46,000 which would later become the basis of the Russian state. 92 00:07:46,000 --> 00:07:49,420 1. Always say one thing and do another. 93 00:07:49,420 --> 00:07:53,300 Lying and hypocrisy are the most effective methods of work. 94 00:07:53,300 --> 00:07:56,140 2. Corruption is the foundation of trust. 95 00:07:56,140 --> 00:08:01,360 Your main friends are those who have been stealing and cheating with you for many years. 96 00:08:01,360 --> 00:08:05,720 3. And the most important thing: There is never too much money. 97 00:08:09,820 --> 00:08:12,980 St. Petersburg 98 00:08:12,980 --> 00:08:15,240 Early 90s, Leningrad. 99 00:08:15,240 --> 00:08:18,660 Think for yourselves how tough a spy Putin was in Dresden, 100 00:08:18,660 --> 00:08:21,060 if, upon returning to Leningrad from the assignment, 101 00:08:21,060 --> 00:08:24,540 he was sent to an unpromising job at Leningrad University. 102 00:08:24,540 --> 00:08:27,820 His old university friend, Nikolai Egorov, also worked there. 103 00:08:27,820 --> 00:08:32,360 This is one of the little-known, but key and most trusted people of Putin. 104 00:08:32,360 --> 00:08:36,400 In the 70s, Egorov and Putin sat at the same desk and were friends. 105 00:08:36,400 --> 00:08:40,680 Along with him, two other Putin’s classmates and closest friends of that time, 106 00:08:40,680 --> 00:08:45,380 Ilgam Ragimov and Viktor Khmarin, were not deprived of his attention either. 107 00:08:45,380 --> 00:08:48,740 Back then, they were united by their passion for martial arts. Let's remember them. 108 00:08:48,740 --> 00:08:54,880 In 1991, the same Yegorov did Putin a favour that changed the life of the future president forever. 109 00:08:54,880 --> 00:08:58,320 He recommended Putin to work in the mayor's office of St. Petersburg 110 00:08:58,320 --> 00:08:59,900 in the committee for external relations. 111 00:08:59,900 --> 00:09:03,380 It is terribly entertaining to recall these pages of Putin's biography now. 112 00:09:03,380 --> 00:09:07,220 After all, he loves to remember how he experienced the collapse of the USSR. 113 00:09:07,220 --> 00:09:12,100 The collapse of the Soviet Union was the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the century 114 00:09:12,100 --> 00:09:18,120 He condemns the 90s, Yeltsinism, democrats and calls everyone around him foreign agents. 115 00:09:18,120 --> 00:09:25,400 I won’t tell you the people that were in charge in the 90s a gang, 116 00:09:25,400 --> 00:09:33,740 but i will note that since then, our social sector and defense industry have completely collapsed. 117 00:09:33,740 --> 00:09:38,700 We’ve lost the defense industry. We’ve practically destroyed the military, 118 00:09:38,700 --> 00:09:44,760 led the country to a civil war, to the bloodbath in Caucasus. 119 00:09:44,760 --> 00:09:47,760 And in those days, Putin took off like greased lightning 120 00:09:47,760 --> 00:09:50,800 to work for one of the main democrats of those times, 121 00:09:50,800 --> 00:09:54,280 the radical critic of the USSR, Anatoly Sobchak. 122 00:09:54,280 --> 00:10:01,200 And so it happened. A man who has dreamed of money all his life has finally got a grasp on this money. 123 00:10:01,200 --> 00:10:06,060 He found himself in a position where there is something to steal. Where bribes are given. 124 00:10:06,060 --> 00:10:09,060 And here, our Vladimir Vladimirovich really showed himself. 125 00:10:09,060 --> 00:10:13,280 The most famous and well researched topic are the export licenses. 126 00:10:13,280 --> 00:10:17,960 Putin was engaged in issuing such licenses to companies that were allowed to sell oil products, 127 00:10:17,960 --> 00:10:22,920 timber, aluminum, copper, cotton (any raw materials) abroad, in exchange for food. 128 00:10:22,920 --> 00:10:27,420 Literally: oil in exchange for sugar and potatoes. Timber in exchange for baby food. 129 00:10:27,420 --> 00:10:30,500 Anatoly Alexandrovich has just told me that 2500 tons of sugar 130 00:10:30,500 --> 00:10:34,960 have just been purchased in Ukraine and prepared for shipment to St. Petersburg. 131 00:10:34,960 --> 00:10:37,260 - So, are we coming through now? 132 00:10:37,260 --> 00:10:41,520 Well, let’s not cross the bridge till we come to it 133 00:10:41,520 --> 00:10:45,400 Putin personally distributed licenses. And as it turned out later, 134 00:10:45,400 --> 00:10:49,700 he gave them to shell companies, including those associated with himself and his friends. 135 00:10:49,700 --> 00:10:53,060 The scheme was elementary. The raw materials went abroad, 136 00:10:53,060 --> 00:10:57,380 the bogus companies received money for it, and the products never arrived. 137 00:10:57,380 --> 00:11:01,880 This is our Motherland, the most valuable thing we have. 138 00:11:01,880 --> 00:11:05,200 One of the main places of income for Putin was the seaport. 139 00:11:05,200 --> 00:11:09,280 This place is legendary, it’s one of the symbols of the bandit Petersburg. 140 00:11:09,280 --> 00:11:14,000 In the early 90s, this strategic facility turned into a criminalized territory, 141 00:11:14,000 --> 00:11:16,900 where people got shot, killed, and were constantly dividing something. 142 00:11:16,900 --> 00:11:20,760 The port was controlled by one of the most famous crime bosses of that time - 143 00:11:20,760 --> 00:11:23,600 Ilya Traber, nicknamed Antiquarian. 144 00:11:23,600 --> 00:11:28,460 Bandits be bandits, but all sorts of papers and permits still needed to be signed and executed. 145 00:11:28,460 --> 00:11:33,920 This is what Putin the official was doing. Formally, he represented the interests of the state, 146 00:11:33,920 --> 00:11:37,840 but in fact, he was helping the bandits working in the port. 147 00:11:37,840 --> 00:11:41,280 He served their interests and was a helpful assistant in the mayor's office 148 00:11:41,280 --> 00:11:44,940 who could help real tough guys solve their problems. 149 00:11:44,940 --> 00:11:47,220 Here’s an example. The oil terminal in the port. 150 00:11:47,220 --> 00:11:51,220 Traber was the chairman of the board of directors, another share was controlled 151 00:11:51,220 --> 00:11:53,700 by the head of the Tambov gang, Gennady Petrov. 152 00:11:53,700 --> 00:11:58,660 And Putin, as said by none other than the head of Gazprom Neft, Alexander Dyukov, 153 00:11:58,660 --> 00:12:01,160 who was then the general director of the terminal, 154 00:12:01,160 --> 00:12:04,540 provided the project with "serious help and support." 155 00:12:04,540 --> 00:12:08,960 It is very easy to see who else Putin provided serious support - 156 00:12:08,960 --> 00:12:13,120 oil products were supplied abroad through the terminal by Gennady Timchenko, 157 00:12:13,120 --> 00:12:18,660 the future billionaire, the main trader of Russian oil and one of the most famous “Putin’s friends”. 158 00:12:18,660 --> 00:12:25,400 Their surnames are kind of strange. Timchen-ko. Typical Russkies. 159 00:12:25,400 --> 00:12:28,100 I think I should keep my distance from them 160 00:12:28,100 --> 00:12:33,400 It was then that the story of his super-profitable business, oil trading company Gunvor, began. 161 00:12:33,400 --> 00:12:38,540 When Putin became president, 4 out of 5 of our country's major oil companies 162 00:12:38,540 --> 00:12:43,220 did not sell their oil abroad directly, but through the Swiss intermediary Gunvor. 163 00:12:43,220 --> 00:12:48,040 Thus, Timchenko, without doing anything, earned incredible money. 164 00:12:48,040 --> 00:12:53,360 Throughout the entire existence of Gunvor, it was believed that Putin had a secret share there, 165 00:12:53,360 --> 00:12:58,940 even the US Treasury officially claimed that Putin had access to Gunvor's money. 166 00:12:58,940 --> 00:13:02,360 But it was not clear to whom this share was registered for many years. 167 00:13:02,360 --> 00:13:07,920 And then it was found out. All this time there was a secret shareholder in Gunvor, Pyotr Kolbin. 168 00:13:07,920 --> 00:13:11,600 No one understood where this amazing shareholder came from 169 00:13:11,600 --> 00:13:14,820 and how a person who says himself that he is not engaged in business 170 00:13:14,820 --> 00:13:18,540 could have millions of dollars to invest in Gunvor. 171 00:13:18,540 --> 00:13:23,860 Until 2016, when journalists discovered that Pyotr Kolbin was Putin's childhood crony, 172 00:13:23,860 --> 00:13:28,420 they grew up in the same village, went to discos together, and had a friendship as families. 173 00:13:28,420 --> 00:13:34,260 And it became obvious that Kolbin was the holder of Putin's share all this time. 174 00:13:34,260 --> 00:13:40,840 You’re probably thinking now: “Wait, does mean that Putin was directly paid bribes? In envelopes?” 175 00:13:40,840 --> 00:13:45,680 Yes! One of the participants of the Petersburg crime scene in the 90s, Maxim Freidzon, 176 00:13:45,680 --> 00:13:49,920 told in an interview how the scheme of interaction with the mayor's office worked. 177 00:13:49,920 --> 00:13:51,660 If it was necessary to formalize something, 178 00:13:51,660 --> 00:13:53,940 they needed to come to the Foreign Relations Committee, 179 00:13:53,940 --> 00:13:57,760 listen to a ceremonial speech about the importance of economic partnership, 180 00:13:57,760 --> 00:14:01,360 and then Putin simply wrote on a piece of paper the required amount of kickback 181 00:14:01,360 --> 00:14:05,600 (a small one 10 or 20 thousand dollars) and added that the money 182 00:14:05,600 --> 00:14:09,120 needed to be “registered” with (that is, brought to) his assistant, Alex Miller. 183 00:14:09,120 --> 00:14:12,800 Now Alex Miller needs no introduction, for almost 20 years 184 00:14:12,800 --> 00:14:15,820 he has been heading our “national treasure” Gazprom. 185 00:14:15,820 --> 00:14:20,080 He is clearly better at registering bribes than running a state-owned company. 186 00:14:20,080 --> 00:14:24,660 In 2008, Miller boasted that in 7-8 years Gazprom would become 187 00:14:24,660 --> 00:14:29,240 the most valuable company in the world with a capitalization of a trillion dollars. 188 00:14:29,240 --> 00:14:32,280 At that moment Gazprom was worth 360 billion. 189 00:14:32,280 --> 00:14:37,000 12 years have passed, and the capitalization of Gazprom is about 70 billion. 190 00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:40,500 That is, it did not grow, but decreased by 5 times. 191 00:14:40,500 --> 00:14:43,740 A perfect example of how Putin's team worked. 192 00:14:43,740 --> 00:14:45,580 I’m not ashamed of my friends 193 00:14:45,580 --> 00:14:46,900 And now, the most important thing. 194 00:14:46,900 --> 00:14:51,280 The story of Putin the official cannot be told without the story of Rossiya Bank. 195 00:14:51,280 --> 00:14:53,620 Putin as we know him wouldn’t exist without it. 196 00:14:53,620 --> 00:14:57,320 This bank was created by the Leningrad Regional Committee of the CPSU. 197 00:14:57,320 --> 00:15:01,760 But in 1991, when both the CPSU and the regional committees ceased to exist, 198 00:15:01,760 --> 00:15:05,560 the mayor of St. Petersburg Sobchak ordered to reorganize this bank. 199 00:15:05,560 --> 00:15:09,760 To put the assets in order, and create a normal commercial structure on their basis 200 00:15:09,760 --> 00:15:13,220 that would help the economy of poverty-stricken St. Petersburg. 201 00:15:13,220 --> 00:15:16,660 And he instructed this to Putin. Putin succeeded. 202 00:15:16,660 --> 00:15:21,100 But most shareholders of the new bank were his, Putin's, friends. 203 00:15:21,100 --> 00:15:23,220 First of all, of course, Yuri Kovalchuk. 204 00:15:23,220 --> 00:15:27,320 He became (and still is) the main shareholder and manager. 205 00:15:27,320 --> 00:15:30,880 In the early 90s, Rossiya was just a small bank controlled by the mayor's office, 206 00:15:30,880 --> 00:15:36,340 and now it is a giant banking monster that serves the country's main corrupt officials 207 00:15:36,340 --> 00:15:38,340 and keeps Putin's personal money. 208 00:15:38,340 --> 00:15:41,920 I ordered the Property Management Department to transfer my salary there. 209 00:15:41,920 --> 00:15:47,400 Everything that was illegally acquired, donated to and stolen by Putin's gang is safe here. 210 00:15:47,400 --> 00:15:52,820 The bank has an imposing and symbolic name - Rossiya. 211 00:15:52,820 --> 00:15:56,740 Despite the fact that 3 decades have passed since Putin worked the St. Petersburg City Hall, 212 00:15:56,740 --> 00:16:02,860 many of you were not even born then, you know very well all the participants in those legendary events. 213 00:16:02,860 --> 00:16:07,040 Look at the honor roll of just one committee that was led by Putin. 214 00:16:07,040 --> 00:16:13,800 It shows the whole team of bribe-takers, who once divided the money from the envelopes that Alex Miller took. 215 00:16:13,800 --> 00:16:17,740 Medvedev became prime minister and president, Miller was put in charge of Gazprom, 216 00:16:17,740 --> 00:16:20,500 Zubkov also was prime minister and is now at Gazprom. 217 00:16:20,500 --> 00:16:23,260 Sechin started as the secretary and porter of Putin’s briefcase, 218 00:16:23,260 --> 00:16:26,500 then he was a minister of Putin’s government, and now he’s the head of Rosneft. 219 00:16:26,500 --> 00:16:28,940 It’s like an unofficial Forbes list. 220 00:16:28,940 --> 00:16:31,560 And here’s Churov. He was assigned to falsify elections 221 00:16:31,560 --> 00:16:34,840 so that unwanted candidates would not be elected and would not interfere with stealing. 222 00:16:34,840 --> 00:16:37,860 Marina Entaltseva became the head of Putin's protocol. 223 00:16:37,860 --> 00:16:41,020 In the neighboring offices sat German Gref, now the head of Sberbank, 224 00:16:41,020 --> 00:16:42,800 Kudrin, Head of the Accounts Chamber, 225 00:16:42,800 --> 00:16:47,040 Kozak, former minister who is now in the presidential administration, and many others. 226 00:16:47,040 --> 00:16:50,840 For more than 30 years they have been officials and in power, 227 00:16:50,840 --> 00:16:54,920 and they like to tell us how they are against the damned 90s. 228 00:16:54,920 --> 00:16:59,280 They are the personification of all the worst that happened in the 90s. 229 00:17:04,440 --> 00:17:06,760 Moscow 230 00:17:06,760 --> 00:17:10,820 All these are old, well-known stories described by journalists. 231 00:17:10,820 --> 00:17:15,060 Not even many years later, but right during Putin's service in the Sobchak mayor's office, 232 00:17:15,060 --> 00:17:19,360 there were scandals, parliamentary investigations and reports on corruption around him. 233 00:17:19,360 --> 00:17:21,740 The newspapers wrote about Putin's machinations. 234 00:17:21,740 --> 00:17:26,040 To be frank, Putin should have been put in jail already back then, in 1996, 235 00:17:26,040 --> 00:17:29,100 when he and Sobchak lost power after losing the elections. 236 00:17:29,100 --> 00:17:32,320 By the way, Putin was then actively working in Sobchak's election headquarters, 237 00:17:32,320 --> 00:17:37,380 and from that moment he realized that fair elections are a terrible thing, 238 00:17:37,380 --> 00:17:38,720 because they can be lost. 239 00:17:38,720 --> 00:17:43,800 But then two guardian angels appeared who saved our Vladimir Vladimirovich. 240 00:17:43,800 --> 00:17:47,880 Those of you who are younger may ask people who remember the 90s well - 241 00:17:47,880 --> 00:17:53,960 who were then the embodiments of corruption? I guarantee you that two names will be said: 242 00:17:53,960 --> 00:17:57,100 Pavel Pavlovich Borodin, Yeltsin's property manager. 243 00:17:57,100 --> 00:18:01,720 All the newspapers of those times wrote about kickbacks at his construction sites. 244 00:18:01,720 --> 00:18:05,680 In the USA and Switzerland, where they operate trillions of dollars, 245 00:18:05,680 --> 00:18:11,520 there must be at least the same amount of thieves, probably much more. 246 00:18:11,520 --> 00:18:13,020 But nobody writes about them. 247 00:18:13,020 --> 00:18:16,740 And Anatoly Borisovich Chubais, he needs no introduction. 248 00:18:16,740 --> 00:18:20,440 It is these two wonderful people that we must thank for the fact 249 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:24,040 that Putin has settled in the Kremlin since 1996. 250 00:18:24,040 --> 00:18:26,720 First, in the Presidential Property Management Department, under Borodin. 251 00:18:26,720 --> 00:18:28,960 As you know, the Presidential Property Management Department 252 00:18:28,960 --> 00:18:33,280 deals with the logistical and financial services of all central authorities. 253 00:18:33,280 --> 00:18:38,780 I will be in charge of contractual and legal activities, since I am a lawyer by training. 254 00:18:38,780 --> 00:18:43,920 And then, I quote, Anatoly Chubais offered a “strong candidate with whom he worked in St. Petersburg” 255 00:18:43,920 --> 00:18:47,560 for a job in the presidential administration. 256 00:18:47,560 --> 00:18:52,280 So Putin became the head of the control department of the Yeltsin administration. 257 00:18:52,280 --> 00:18:55,620 What an irony, the main corrupt officials of those times 258 00:18:55,620 --> 00:18:59,880 pondered who should be appointed to the position of the inspector in the administration. 259 00:18:59,880 --> 00:19:05,620 Who will check, but diligently ignore corruption? And they chose Putin. 260 00:19:05,620 --> 00:19:10,100 This is my profession, and I find it interesting. 261 00:19:10,100 --> 00:19:13,060 Putin was given a state dacha in Arkhangelskoye, an official car, 262 00:19:13,060 --> 00:19:16,920 but actually very little is known about his lifestyle. 263 00:19:16,920 --> 00:19:22,400 We found a good witness of those times though, a direct participant in all those events. 264 00:19:22,400 --> 00:19:24,480 It’s the ex-wife of Putin - Lyudmila. 265 00:19:24,480 --> 00:19:30,400 In the mid-90s, Lyudmila Putina, during her trip to Hamburg, met a German woman, Irene, 266 00:19:30,400 --> 00:19:32,460 and the two became penfriends. 267 00:19:32,460 --> 00:19:35,720 For several years they sent each other handwritten letters 268 00:19:35,720 --> 00:19:38,660 in which Lyudmila told in detail about her life. 269 00:19:38,660 --> 00:19:45,360 Here are these letters. From 1996, 1997, 1998 - then they stopped communicating. 270 00:19:45,360 --> 00:19:51,440 Lyudmila’s former friend even wrote a book about this called "Spicy Friendship". 271 00:19:51,440 --> 00:19:55,860 It was published in Russian in 2002, but unfortunately it quickly disappeared from the shelves. 272 00:19:55,860 --> 00:19:59,980 It contains excellent photographs of Putin's already very recognizable daughters, 273 00:19:59,980 --> 00:20:02,480 or “these women,” as he himself calls them. 274 00:20:02,480 --> 00:20:06,240 You mentioned one woman, then another one… 275 00:20:06,240 --> 00:20:10,240 We have carefully studied every word - both in the book and in the letters themselves. 276 00:20:10,240 --> 00:20:13,780 They mostly contain completely uninteresting stories about personal things - 277 00:20:13,780 --> 00:20:16,040 about the weather, children and horoscopes. 278 00:20:16,040 --> 00:20:21,500 But there is still something important there. Firstly, where these letters were sent from. 279 00:20:21,500 --> 00:20:24,180 At the top of the page, you can see a phone number. 280 00:20:24,180 --> 00:20:28,860 Lyudmila Putina sent them either from home or from the “office” as she herself writes - 281 00:20:28,860 --> 00:20:32,980 and this office was the St. Petersburg seaport, the very one that, 282 00:20:32,980 --> 00:20:38,640 thanks to the help of Putin the official, became the property of the crime boss Ilya Traber. 283 00:20:38,640 --> 00:20:41,080 What was the official's wife doing there? 284 00:20:41,080 --> 00:20:43,560 Or, here, an office called “Interkommerz Warnig”. 285 00:20:43,560 --> 00:20:49,340 This is Matthias Warnig, a banker and a former Stasi employee who worked with Putin back in Germany, 286 00:20:49,340 --> 00:20:52,320 and then moved to St. Petersburg to head the Dresdner Bank. 287 00:20:52,320 --> 00:20:56,720 Lyudmila’s German friend was very surprised at how close Putin and Warnig were. 288 00:20:56,720 --> 00:21:00,700 Warnig paid for the treatment of Lyudmila Putin abroad, took upon himself 289 00:21:00,700 --> 00:21:05,720 the costs and organization of the Putin family vacations - hotels were booked in his name. 290 00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:11,920 This is called a bribe in specie: Putin works in the presidential administration, 291 00:21:11,920 --> 00:21:16,660 and a German banker and former intelligence officer pays for his family's expenses. 292 00:21:16,660 --> 00:21:22,040 It seems to me that this is exactly what should be called by Putin's favorite term “foreign agent”. 293 00:21:22,040 --> 00:21:25,440 It wasn’t us who came up with the term “foreign agent”. 294 00:21:25,440 --> 00:21:27,940 Such a law has existed in the USA since the 30s. 295 00:21:27,940 --> 00:21:33,120 I think it was adopted in 1938 or 1939, and it works perfectly 296 00:21:33,120 --> 00:21:36,980 Warnig's expenses on the Putin family were more than reimbursed. 297 00:21:36,980 --> 00:21:40,200 Today this person is the managing director of Nord Stream, 298 00:21:40,200 --> 00:21:45,280 as well as a member of the boards of directors of Rosneft, Transneft, Bank of Russia, RUSAL, 299 00:21:45,280 --> 00:21:50,080 a member of the supervisory board of VTB and the administrative council of Swiss Gazprom. 300 00:21:50,080 --> 00:21:52,500 In addition to the vacations, to which we will return, 301 00:21:52,500 --> 00:21:57,420 the absolute obsession of the Putin family with real estate is immediately evident. 302 00:21:57,420 --> 00:22:01,360 By that time, they had already received one service apartment in St. Petersburg. 303 00:22:01,360 --> 00:22:04,560 But with the move to Moscow, all that worried the Putins 304 00:22:04,560 --> 00:22:08,740 was whether they would get a new apartment from the city and have the old one taken away. 305 00:22:08,740 --> 00:22:12,180 Lyudmila says with annoyance that their friends Chemezovs 306 00:22:12,180 --> 00:22:18,300 have already received a two-story apartment and thoroughly describes every square meter of it. 307 00:22:18,300 --> 00:22:20,740 By the way, there was a very similar story with Sechin, 308 00:22:20,740 --> 00:22:24,460 but we learned it not from letters, but from a recent book about Putin. 309 00:22:24,460 --> 00:22:26,260 In it, a common acquaintance of Putin and Sechin 310 00:22:26,260 --> 00:22:30,200 tells how they were resettled in service apartments after moving to Moscow. 311 00:22:30,200 --> 00:22:33,760 When Vladimir Vladimirovich came to visit Igor Ivanovich, 312 00:22:33,760 --> 00:22:41,620 he asked how large his apartment was. Sechin's apartment was 317 m2, Putin's was 286 m2. 313 00:22:41,620 --> 00:22:45,420 Sechin told his friend that Putin only said “congratulations”, 314 00:22:45,420 --> 00:22:50,400 but the feeling was as if he wanted to shoot him with a well-aimed shot in the head. 315 00:22:50,400 --> 00:22:53,860 For several weeks after that, they did not talk. 316 00:22:53,860 --> 00:22:59,840 From Lyudmila's letters, we learn a lot about Putin's life already at the end of those wild 90s. 317 00:22:59,840 --> 00:23:03,620 Who they communicated with, where they went. 318 00:23:03,620 --> 00:23:07,880 Lyudmila describes in detail each vacation - in 1996 they spend 6 weeks in Davos, 319 00:23:07,880 --> 00:23:11,740 together with the Shamalov family, with whom they will become related in 15 years. 320 00:23:11,740 --> 00:23:16,480 Several times a year the family of the official travels to France - 321 00:23:16,480 --> 00:23:19,340 in the summer to have a rest on the sea, and in the winter to ski. 322 00:23:19,340 --> 00:23:24,860 And here is my favorite piece. Lyudmila Putina exposes a typical Putin lie. 323 00:23:24,860 --> 00:23:30,320 She describes how in the summer of 1998 we went on vacation to Cannes for 6 weeks. 324 00:23:30,320 --> 00:23:35,140 But on July 22, Putin had to abruptly interrupt his vacation and return to Moscow - 325 00:23:35,140 --> 00:23:37,240 he was appointed director of the FSB. 326 00:23:37,240 --> 00:23:40,820 We chose Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin for a reason. 327 00:23:40,820 --> 00:23:47,800 He’s a professional with experience in the entire range of tasks the FSB faces 328 00:23:47,800 --> 00:23:52,260 This episode is also described in the only official biography of Putin. 329 00:23:52,260 --> 00:23:56,380 Only according to their version, the vacation was not in Cannes, but on the Baltic Sea. 330 00:23:56,380 --> 00:23:59,000 And there wasn’t the entire Putin family there, but only Lyudmila. 331 00:23:59,000 --> 00:24:02,640 We get surprised at the current degradation of special services and rampant corruption. 332 00:24:02,640 --> 00:24:06,000 But why should we be surprised if, already in 98, an official 333 00:24:06,000 --> 00:24:11,860 whose family has been living for a month and a half in a hotel on the French Riviera 334 00:24:11,860 --> 00:24:14,920 was appointed head of the main special service? 335 00:24:14,920 --> 00:24:18,280 With what money? It’s clear that this money was dirty. 336 00:24:18,280 --> 00:24:22,080 It’s clear that thieves like him made him the director of the FSB 337 00:24:22,080 --> 00:24:23,740 so that he could solve their problems. 338 00:24:23,740 --> 00:24:27,800 Look at these shots, tanned Putin, having flown in from France, 339 00:24:27,800 --> 00:24:32,660 sits next to Kiriienko on the day of his appointment, rejoicing at his "return to his home." 340 00:24:32,660 --> 00:24:40,320 For me, returning to work at the security apparatus is like returning to my home 341 00:24:40,320 --> 00:24:44,080 After becoming the head of the FSB, Putin did exactly what he was supposed to do: 342 00:24:44,080 --> 00:24:46,500 helped corrupt officials evade responsibility. 343 00:24:46,500 --> 00:24:50,080 The then general prosecutor Skuratov was gunning for the Yeltsin family, 344 00:24:50,080 --> 00:24:56,020 accusing them of theft and bribes. To neutralize Skuratov, the FSB organized a whole operation, 345 00:24:56,020 --> 00:24:59,140 the result of which was the showing on federal television 346 00:24:59,140 --> 00:25:03,060 of the famous tape with a “man similar to the Prosecutor General”. 347 00:25:03,060 --> 00:25:06,980 You will now see a man very similar to the Prosecutor General of Russian Federation 348 00:25:06,980 --> 00:25:08,980 in the company of some call girls. 349 00:25:08,980 --> 00:25:12,500 We must warn you: this shouldn’t be watched by people under 18 350 00:25:12,500 --> 00:25:14,840 After the publication, Putin also spoke personally 351 00:25:14,840 --> 00:25:17,600 and said that this was not “a person who looked like Skuratov”, 352 00:25:17,600 --> 00:25:20,680 but Skuratov himself, and he must resign. 353 00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:25,140 My views are well known. They are the same as those of the President 354 00:25:25,140 --> 00:25:28,500 and the Prime Minister. Skuratov must resign. 355 00:25:28,500 --> 00:25:31,080 Which is what happened. Skuratov was removed from office. 356 00:25:31,080 --> 00:25:34,020 The corrupt Yeltsin family was saved. And literally four months later, 357 00:25:34,020 --> 00:25:41,820 realizing that they could not find a more reliable and appropriate person in spirit, 358 00:25:41,820 --> 00:25:46,500 it was Yeltsin's family, “Tanya and Valya”, who made Putin the successor: 359 00:25:46,500 --> 00:25:50,060 first the Prime Minister, and then the President of Russia. 360 00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:57,680 [25:55] The Palace 361 00:25:57,680 --> 00:25:59,960 As soon as Putin established himself in power - 362 00:25:59,960 --> 00:26:02,240 that is, after he subjugated television and the courts 363 00:26:02,240 --> 00:26:04,120 and established a system of electoral fraud - 364 00:26:04,120 --> 00:26:09,660 the largest operation to seize and milk Russia began (and continues to this day). 365 00:26:09,660 --> 00:26:13,540 Every Putin’s friend gets a piece. One sits on the streams of Gazprom, 366 00:26:13,540 --> 00:26:18,120 the second begins to milk Rosneft, the third takes over the largest construction projects. 367 00:26:18,120 --> 00:26:21,340 A gang of bribe-takers and crooks from the St. Petersburg mayor's office 368 00:26:21,340 --> 00:26:26,900 seized all key posts and declared themselves brilliant managers and saviors of Russia. 369 00:26:26,900 --> 00:26:29,500 But despite the fact that our heroes got suited up 370 00:26:29,500 --> 00:26:31,480 and surrounded themselves with hundreds of guards, 371 00:26:31,480 --> 00:26:34,320 the key principle on which everything has been held 372 00:26:34,320 --> 00:26:37,620 since the wild 90s in St. Petersburg stayed the same. 373 00:26:37,620 --> 00:26:41,920 You want to steal from the budget and milk state property? Share with Putin. 374 00:26:41,920 --> 00:26:44,860 Alright, I agree, it’s a deal 375 00:26:44,860 --> 00:26:48,840 And if before Putin wrote relatively small amounts in dollars on a piece of paper, 376 00:26:48,840 --> 00:26:53,880 and Alex Miller collected them for him, then this time they wrote a word on the piece of paper. 377 00:26:53,880 --> 00:26:55,880 And that word was “palace”. 378 00:26:55,880 --> 00:26:58,420 It’s the world’s largest construction project 379 00:26:58,420 --> 00:27:02,400 The most secret and guarded facility in Russia, without exaggeration. 380 00:27:02,400 --> 00:27:05,080 This is not a country house, not a dacha, not a residence - 381 00:27:05,080 --> 00:27:07,740 this is a whole city, or rather a kingdom. 382 00:27:07,740 --> 00:27:11,560 It has impregnable fences, its own port, its own guards, a church, 383 00:27:11,560 --> 00:27:16,040 its own access control, a no-fly zone and even its own border checkpoint. 384 00:27:16,040 --> 00:27:18,720 It is an actual separate state within Russia. 385 00:27:18,720 --> 00:27:22,780 And in this state, there is a single and irreplaceable king: Putin. 386 00:27:22,780 --> 00:27:28,300 Wait, you’ll say, we heard about this palace, we know that it was once built for Putin, 387 00:27:28,300 --> 00:27:31,560 but then, when the whole story was revealed, the construction was frozen, 388 00:27:31,560 --> 00:27:36,620 and some businessman bought the palace, right? You are telling us some old story. 389 00:27:36,620 --> 00:27:39,980 You are wrong. This story is unknown to anyone. 390 00:27:39,980 --> 00:27:46,940 Firstly, you cannot imagine the true size of this palace. Secondly, there was no sale. 391 00:27:46,940 --> 00:27:53,640 This is a legal illusion created through several bogus deals and an active media campaign. 392 00:27:53,640 --> 00:27:59,240 The only real owner of this famous place from the very beginning to the present day 393 00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:01,140 is Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. 394 00:28:01,140 --> 00:28:07,480 And finally, looking inside, you will understand that the president of Russia is mentally ill. 395 00:28:07,480 --> 00:28:10,820 He is obsessed with wealth and luxury. 396 00:28:10,820 --> 00:28:15,880 Can you imagine the Principality of Monaco? It is small, but still a separate country. 397 00:28:15,880 --> 00:28:19,520 Well, this is a property the size of 39 principalities of Monaco. 398 00:28:19,520 --> 00:28:24,700 It was built so that it would not be possible to get to it by land, sea or air. 399 00:28:24,700 --> 00:28:30,140 Thousands of people working there are forbidden to bring even a simple mobile phone with a camera. 400 00:28:30,140 --> 00:28:34,260 Arriving cars are inspected at several checkpoints, with the help of mirrors 401 00:28:34,260 --> 00:28:38,020 and pits with video cameras, trunks and glove compartments get searched. 402 00:28:38,020 --> 00:28:39,960 But we'll come in anyway. 403 00:28:39,960 --> 00:28:42,460 What is this, have you gone mad? 404 00:28:42,460 --> 00:28:47,500 For many years we have shown you the property of corrupt officials from the air, from the outside. 405 00:28:47,500 --> 00:28:51,600 But today, we’ll show you the palace of the MOST corrupt official from the inside. 406 00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:55,340 In addition to a tour of the royal chambers, I am sure you are looking forward to it, 407 00:28:55,340 --> 00:28:59,100 you will find out that the real Putin's palace is not just this house, 408 00:28:59,100 --> 00:29:06,040 but another 7800 hectares of land, almost 300 hectares of vineyards in four different places, 409 00:29:06,040 --> 00:29:11,560 a chateau, wineries, oyster farms and endless luxury. 410 00:29:11,560 --> 00:29:15,400 I will tell you where this palace came from, whose money it was built on 411 00:29:15,400 --> 00:29:18,240 and whose money it continues to be constructed on right now. 412 00:29:18,240 --> 00:29:19,080 Let’s go. 413 00:29:34,120 --> 00:29:35,880 Hello everyone, this is Georgy Alburov. 414 00:29:35,880 --> 00:29:39,820 As you may have noticed, we are in a slightly unusual environment for us. 415 00:29:39,820 --> 00:29:43,480 You see, we are in Krasnodar Krai, on the Black Sea coast, 416 00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:49,820 literally 3 kilometers from the famous Putin's Palace. We came here in a very strange way. 417 00:29:49,820 --> 00:29:54,680 We changed tickets, got off at the wrong stops, exchanged SIM cards and phones. 418 00:29:54,680 --> 00:29:57,520 We carried out a whole special operation to get here. 419 00:29:57,520 --> 00:30:01,840 All this was done so that we don’t get pursued by the police, FSB officers 420 00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:06,600 and employees of the “E” center, who always do this when we come to Krasnodar Krai. 421 00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:11,420 And we managed to do it. Right now, we are a few hundred meters from the shore, 422 00:30:11,420 --> 00:30:16,420 and not a single policeman tens of kilometers around knows what we are doing here. 423 00:30:16,420 --> 00:30:20,320 This is great because right now we are going to launch a drone 424 00:30:20,320 --> 00:30:23,380 and take for you the legendary footage of Putin's palace, 425 00:30:23,380 --> 00:30:26,300 which has never been seen from a drone. 426 00:30:26,300 --> 00:30:30,360 It is so classified that it is guarded by the Federal Security Service. 427 00:30:40,140 --> 00:30:43,000 Everyone said that it was impossible to film it. 428 00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:45,880 Yes, we thought so ourselves, and then we went ahead and tried it. 429 00:30:45,880 --> 00:30:50,980 It didn't work, so we tried it again. We tried four times, but only succeeded once. 430 00:30:50,980 --> 00:30:56,520 We present to you the most secret palace in Russia - Putin's palace near Gelendzhik. 431 00:30:56,520 --> 00:31:01,540 Here it is, right in front of you. This is the largest private residential building in Russia, 432 00:31:01,540 --> 00:31:07,440 its officially confirmed area according to documents is 17,691 m2. 433 00:31:07,440 --> 00:31:09,440 And there is not even much to compare it with. 434 00:31:09,440 --> 00:31:13,120 The most luxurious houses on Rublyovka are several times smaller. 435 00:31:13,120 --> 00:31:18,340 This is the new Versailles, or the new Winter Palace - a truly royal place. 436 00:31:18,340 --> 00:31:24,960 For now, we only admire it from the outside. Let's get close enough to see everything in detail. 437 00:31:24,960 --> 00:31:29,300 Huh, what's going on here? Some kind of blue tarp, the windows are caulked, 438 00:31:29,300 --> 00:31:32,340 the pool is closed, building materials are lying on the ground, 439 00:31:32,340 --> 00:31:35,160 workers, barely noticeable against the background of the palace, scurry about. 440 00:31:35,160 --> 00:31:37,740 What is happening, why is there a construction site 441 00:31:37,740 --> 00:31:43,180 if 6-year-old satellite images showed that the palace was completely ready? 442 00:31:43,180 --> 00:31:47,280 The builders explained it to us. Everything was really ready a long time ago, 443 00:31:47,280 --> 00:31:52,440 but then a disaster struck. Its name is mold. And sloppiness. 444 00:31:52,440 --> 00:31:56,940 The palace was designed with mistakes - ventilation did not work, the ceiling leaked, 445 00:31:56,940 --> 00:32:01,820 high humidity - in general, they decided to redo everything. Absolutely everything. 446 00:32:01,820 --> 00:32:05,720 They stripped the walls, stripped off the marble, took out everything of value, 447 00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:09,920 literally threw billions into the trash and started all over. 448 00:32:09,920 --> 00:32:15,320 But what’s a waste and a headache for Putin is a chance for us to learn more about his palace. 449 00:32:15,320 --> 00:32:18,220 After all, a lot of people were involved in the reconstruction, 450 00:32:18,220 --> 00:32:23,200 and they were happy to tell us about literally every square meter of this grandiose object. 451 00:32:23,200 --> 00:32:27,600 For example, the arboretum. Rare and unique trees are gathered there. 452 00:32:27,600 --> 00:32:30,680 And for those plants that are uncomfortable in such a climate 453 00:32:30,680 --> 00:32:36,460 a 2500 m2 greenhouse was built in the open air. 454 00:32:36,460 --> 00:32:39,740 These trees and plants in general on the territory 455 00:32:39,740 --> 00:32:44,340 are constantly monitored by a total of about forty gardeners. 456 00:32:44,340 --> 00:32:48,740 We fly further and see a wall of greenery, and inside it there are sculptures. 457 00:32:48,740 --> 00:32:51,140 It's a pity you can't see who they are of. 458 00:32:51,140 --> 00:32:55,640 Maybe a monument to the patron saint Yeltsin, maybe Lesha Miller with an envelope, 459 00:32:55,640 --> 00:33:01,140 maybe a bust of the goddess of theft or a sculptural composition “These women”. 460 00:33:01,140 --> 00:33:03,440 Next is another important object - a church. 461 00:33:03,440 --> 00:33:07,580 It’s not the temple of the Ministry of Defense, of course, and in general it does not look very Orthodox. 462 00:33:07,580 --> 00:33:11,120 A bunch of some kind of construction trailers, obviously workers live there. 463 00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:15,400 We see a giant 80-meter bridge. In any Russian region, 464 00:33:15,400 --> 00:33:20,740 its opening would be a whole event, but here it is simply needed to get to the teahouse. 465 00:33:20,740 --> 00:33:26,240 On the right we see 2 helipads. Strange, there were three of them before. 466 00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:29,360 One was removed and a mound was made in its place. 467 00:33:29,360 --> 00:33:33,040 It’s a very strange mound though, it has several entrances. 468 00:33:33,040 --> 00:33:35,500 For a long time we tried to understand what was inside 469 00:33:35,500 --> 00:33:40,180 and at some point we saw the insides of this mountain on satellite images. 470 00:33:40,180 --> 00:33:47,340 Rectangle with rounded corners measuring 56 by 26 meters. It's a hockey rink! 471 00:33:47,340 --> 00:33:51,560 Indeed, who needs a palace in which you cannot play hockey? 472 00:33:51,560 --> 00:33:55,520 This is the first time we see the underground hockey complex though. 473 00:33:55,520 --> 00:33:59,920 The owner's bunkering style is recognized - he likes to sit underground. 474 00:33:59,920 --> 00:34:04,440 He probably imagines himself a gnome from the Lord of the Rings movie, guarding his gold. 475 00:34:04,440 --> 00:34:08,900 The contractors confirmed to us that they indeed buried an ice palace underground, 476 00:34:08,900 --> 00:34:11,920 which is actually the height of a five-story building. 477 00:34:11,920 --> 00:34:17,440 A little shocked, we fly further to that part of the palace, which is responsible for its sustainment. 478 00:34:17,440 --> 00:34:20,540 We see a 200 m2 building with a tower and air conditioning. 479 00:34:20,540 --> 00:34:24,680 It was not labelled in the documents, but an oil product pipeline was laid to it, 480 00:34:24,680 --> 00:34:29,500 and heat supply networks go from it. So, this must be the boiler room. 481 00:34:29,500 --> 00:34:32,380 The huge mast further away is responsible for communications. 482 00:34:32,380 --> 00:34:37,540 There are both base stations of cellular operators and government communications antennas there. 483 00:34:37,540 --> 00:34:43,700 In the distance is an own gas station. We see several residential buildings and a garage complex. 484 00:34:43,700 --> 00:34:48,320 On the right is a dormitory for personnel, where personnel of not the highest categories live - 485 00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:50,600 security guards and construction workers. 486 00:34:50,600 --> 00:34:54,440 And next to it is the brain of the whole complex - the headquarters building. 487 00:34:54,440 --> 00:34:57,740 The main managers work in this building. 488 00:34:57,740 --> 00:35:03,600 Let's turn around a bit and just admire the view that opens from here. Very nice. 489 00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:07,680 Previously, this could only be seen by Putin from a helicopter, but now you can see it too. 490 00:35:07,680 --> 00:35:11,560 Let's fly to the back of the palace to look at a couple more objects. 491 00:35:11,560 --> 00:35:16,000 Here is a grandiose fence, through which no outside thief can get through. 492 00:35:16,000 --> 00:35:19,680 On the right is the very building for which the 80-meter bridge was built. 493 00:35:19,680 --> 00:35:26,020 This is a guest house aka Tea House with an area of ​​2,500 m2. 494 00:35:26,020 --> 00:35:29,080 And here is the long-suffering amphitheater. 495 00:35:29,080 --> 00:35:34,200 This simple object is being built and rebuilt continuously over the years. 496 00:35:34,200 --> 00:35:37,820 The owner of the palace is clearly dissatisfied with the result. 497 00:35:37,820 --> 00:35:43,400 Maybe it should be more suitable for gladiatorial battles between Sechin and Chemezov. 498 00:35:43,400 --> 00:35:48,280 Maybe cellist Roldugin criticizes its acoustics. We can only guess. 499 00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:52,020 But the workers are constantly swarming there. Let's fly off again. 500 00:35:52,020 --> 00:35:54,320 So, how do you get to the beach? 501 00:35:54,320 --> 00:35:58,160 You put on his swimming trunks, take your flippers, but how do you get down? It’s a mountain. 502 00:35:58,160 --> 00:36:00,300 Here is the entrance to a special tunnel, 503 00:36:00,300 --> 00:36:03,900 which was built by the same people who are building the metro. 504 00:36:03,900 --> 00:36:08,320 This is a unique structure that allows not only convenient access to the sea, 505 00:36:08,320 --> 00:36:12,880 but also shelter in case of war or attack from the residents of Gelendzhik. 506 00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:18,680 And this tunnel has a small secret that one of the builders of the palace revealed to us. 507 00:36:18,680 --> 00:36:24,160 Do you see some kind of a door here? Look at this photo - you can see it a little better. 508 00:36:24,160 --> 00:36:26,260 And this is the place on the tunnel scheme. 509 00:36:26,260 --> 00:36:32,000 This, my friends, is the tasting room disguised like a part of the mountain. 510 00:36:32,000 --> 00:36:37,980 In fact, it is a huge window that offers the best possible sea view. 511 00:36:37,980 --> 00:36:43,140 Here you can enjoy a glass of wine, and, what’s most important for our national leader, 512 00:36:43,140 --> 00:36:46,440 it’s not some kind of balcony where you are constantly in danger, 513 00:36:46,440 --> 00:36:51,580 but a very safe underground place where nothing threatens you. 514 00:36:51,580 --> 00:36:55,580 And now for something that’s impossible to show with a drone - the scale. 515 00:36:55,580 --> 00:37:01,800 We flew here, this is the huge palace complex, the land plot around it is 68 hectares. 516 00:37:01,800 --> 00:37:05,540 But in fact, the territory of the palace is about 100 times larger. 517 00:37:05,540 --> 00:37:09,320 This land plot - forests and mountains, with an area of ​​7,000 hectares, 518 00:37:09,320 --> 00:37:12,760 70 million (!!!) square meters, belongs to the FSB. 519 00:37:12,760 --> 00:37:20,100 And in September 2020, it was fully leased until 2068 to the company that owns the palace. 520 00:37:20,100 --> 00:37:25,620 Do you know why? To carry out research and educational activities. 521 00:37:25,620 --> 00:37:30,220 In fact, the only purpose of renting this really gigantic piece of land, 522 00:37:30,220 --> 00:37:33,840 which is 3.5 times larger than neighboring Gelendzhik, 523 00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:37,480 is to create something like a buffer around Putin's palace. 524 00:37:37,480 --> 00:37:40,720 So that no one can, while accidentally walking through beautiful places, 525 00:37:40,720 --> 00:37:45,600 come too close to the fence of the secret object. And not only on the ground. 526 00:37:45,600 --> 00:37:50,280 Usually, in order to go to sea on any boat - be it an inflatable boat or even on a yacht, 527 00:37:50,280 --> 00:37:54,560 you need to follow a simple procedure - call the local border department of the FSB 528 00:37:54,560 --> 00:37:56,960 and notify it about your plans by phone. 529 00:37:56,960 --> 00:38:01,980 A pure formality - you can fish and swim pretty much anywhere. But not here. 530 00:38:01,980 --> 00:38:03,400 - Good day, yes 531 00:38:03,400 --> 00:38:04,860 - Happy New Year! 532 00:38:04,860 --> 00:38:06,140 - Happy New Year to you 533 00:38:08,220 --> 00:38:13,020 - Do you want to go past Krinitsa or just go fishing here in the Praskoveevka area? 534 00:38:13,020 --> 00:38:18,380 - Well, we want to go from Dzhankhot to Krinitsa, around that area 535 00:38:20,380 --> 00:38:24,980 - Well then, there will be a big request to you. Do you know Cape Idokopas? 536 00:38:24,980 --> 00:38:28,100 - Sort of, is it after the Parus rock? 537 00:38:28,100 --> 00:38:33,940 - Yes, there will be a a large cape after Parus Rock, you will have to go around it by a mile 538 00:38:33,940 --> 00:38:35,420 - By a mile? 539 00:38:35,420 --> 00:38:37,620 - Yes 540 00:38:37,620 --> 00:38:41,700 - Got it, was there an accident there? 541 00:38:41,700 --> 00:38:47,020 - No, well, it's just our request to you that you go around this particular section by a mile… 542 00:38:47,020 --> 00:38:51,640 Please keep this distance when you go there 543 00:38:51,640 --> 00:38:58,040 - And tell me, please, is it always like this with Idokopas or just on some days? 544 00:38:58,040 --> 00:38:59,140 - Always 545 00:38:59,140 --> 00:39:05,900 - Got you. Do we need to get a permission from other departments then? From the FSO? 546 00:39:05,900 --> 00:39:06,960 - Yes of course. 547 00:39:06,960 --> 00:39:11,020 - Should we do it in writing somehow or by phone through the person on duty? 548 00:39:11,020 --> 00:39:18,020 - Don’t ask me this, we don’t issue such permissions at all. 549 00:39:18,020 --> 00:39:20,940 So, because of Putin's dacha, all fishermen 550 00:39:20,940 --> 00:39:24,900 are simply sent around it to the open sea 2 kilometers from the coast. 551 00:39:24,900 --> 00:39:31,640 And all this is so that no one accidentally sees up close what is built there on this Idokopas cape. 552 00:39:31,640 --> 00:39:34,220 And you can't get close to the dacha from the air either. 553 00:39:34,220 --> 00:39:37,880 Above it is the official no-fly zone URP116. 554 00:39:37,880 --> 00:39:42,220 Just like over nuclear power plants or secret military facilities. 555 00:39:42,220 --> 00:39:44,860 The order of the Ministry of Transport includes the address 556 00:39:44,860 --> 00:39:46,760 and telephone number of those responsible for this zone. 557 00:39:46,760 --> 00:39:52,040 Let’s google the address: It’s either the SHUSTRIK online store responsible for the no-fly zone 558 00:39:52,040 --> 00:39:55,540 above Putin's palace, or the Border Directorate of the FSB for Krasnodar Krai. 559 00:39:55,540 --> 00:40:00,280 Why would the FSB establish a no-fly zone over a private palace? 560 00:40:00,280 --> 00:40:04,180 There can be only one answer - this is the palace of the very person 561 00:40:04,180 --> 00:40:07,040 for whose safety the FSB is responsible. 562 00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:13,820 It’s very important for me. I already said that I can’t work without it. 563 00:40:13,820 --> 00:40:17,560 How could this have been built in secret from the whole country? - 564 00:40:17,560 --> 00:40:19,800 any normal person is shouting now. 565 00:40:19,800 --> 00:40:23,140 Underground hockey stadiums, tunnels inside the mountain. 566 00:40:23,140 --> 00:40:26,480 This is colossal work and no less colossal money. 567 00:40:26,480 --> 00:40:29,940 Someone must have paid it, right? Quite right. 568 00:40:29,940 --> 00:40:32,740 We have found out everything and will tell you now. 569 00:40:32,740 --> 00:40:37,420 We go back to the past again, just about to the point where we stopped. 570 00:40:37,420 --> 00:40:41,240 The year 2005. Putin just started his second term. 571 00:40:41,240 --> 00:40:44,420 Where the palace now stands is an open field, or rather a mountain. 572 00:40:44,420 --> 00:40:47,140 The head of the presidential administration and Putin's friend 573 00:40:47,140 --> 00:40:51,340 from the time of the St. Petersburg mayor's office, Vladimir Kozhin, signs an investment agreement 574 00:40:51,340 --> 00:40:56,780 for the construction of a "Children's sports and recreation camp for year-round action" here. 575 00:40:56,780 --> 00:40:59,660 According to the agreement, the construction will be carried out together 576 00:40:59,660 --> 00:41:02,520 by the presidential administration and the investor, “Lirus” company. 577 00:41:02,520 --> 00:41:08,540 Naturally, they were not going to build any camp. I keep repeating that Putin is always lying. 578 00:41:08,540 --> 00:41:13,560 And in 2005, under the guise of a camp, they were going to build a dacha straight away. 579 00:41:13,560 --> 00:41:17,000 We say one thing and do another. 580 00:41:17,000 --> 00:41:21,700 There were three shareholders in “Lirus”. Nikolai Shamalov, the same family friend 581 00:41:21,700 --> 00:41:26,440 (and in the future an affiancer) with whom the Putins spent 6 weeks in Davos in 1996. 582 00:41:26,440 --> 00:41:32,160 And two more - retired KGB colonel Dmitry Gorelov and businessman Sergei Kolesnikov. 583 00:41:32,160 --> 00:41:35,840 Why did these people suddenly decide to build a children's camp near Gelendzhik? 584 00:41:35,840 --> 00:41:38,040 One of them told everyone about it. 585 00:41:38,040 --> 00:41:50,240 Around 2005 or 2006, an idea arose: Why not build a small house at the Black Sea coast? 586 00:41:50,240 --> 00:42:01,560 The presidential term isn’t infinite, it will end soon, he’ll need to step down, 587 00:42:01,560 --> 00:42:04,420 and he wanted to have something left after retirement. 588 00:42:04,420 --> 00:42:12,120 Everything was discussed with Shamalov and Kozhin, head of the Department for Presidential Affairs. 589 00:42:12,120 --> 00:42:19,980 Kozhin showed him the land plot, the agreement on its allocation. 590 00:42:19,980 --> 00:42:28,960 And then, this small house started turning into some sort of a huge palace. 591 00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:33,300 In 2010, Sergei Kolesnikov published an open letter 592 00:42:33,300 --> 00:42:38,180 calling on President Medvedev to end Putin's corruption. 593 00:42:38,180 --> 00:42:43,460 Kolesnikov, as a person involved in the palace construction project, told literally everything: 594 00:42:43,460 --> 00:42:46,660 where is what is being built, on whose money, in whose name it is registered, 595 00:42:46,660 --> 00:42:50,260 all the machinations - with offshore companies, with bearer shares - everything. 596 00:42:50,260 --> 00:42:55,120 He published documents - postings, contracts, audio recordings 597 00:42:55,120 --> 00:43:00,440 of negotiations between builders and sponsors. It all happened 10 years ago, and to be honest, 598 00:43:00,440 --> 00:43:05,220 there have probably been no leaks of this magnitude and reliability since that moment. 599 00:43:05,220 --> 00:43:08,140 The essence is as follows. Kolesnikov, together with Gorelov, 600 00:43:08,140 --> 00:43:10,800 founded the “Petromed” company in the early 90s. 601 00:43:10,800 --> 00:43:13,740 The St. Petersburg mayor's office also had a stake in this company, 602 00:43:13,740 --> 00:43:16,260 and as you remember, the interests of the city in such companies 603 00:43:16,260 --> 00:43:18,380 were represented by the deputy mayor Vladimir Putin. 604 00:43:18,380 --> 00:43:23,240 So, Putin, Kolesnikov and Gorelov had known each other for many years. 605 00:43:23,240 --> 00:43:26,980 At the beginning of 2000 Nikolay Shamalov came to “Petromed” 606 00:43:26,980 --> 00:43:33,480 with a personal offer from newly elected president Putin, who was looking to earn some money. 607 00:43:33,480 --> 00:43:37,220 The proposal, like everything that Putin comes up with, was openly corrupt. 608 00:43:37,220 --> 00:43:40,220 And it is especially funny given the fact that after becoming president, 609 00:43:40,220 --> 00:43:44,280 Putin publicly announced that he was starting a fight against the oligarchs. 610 00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:48,820 In our country, oligarchs were representatives of large business 611 00:43:48,820 --> 00:43:56,920 who try to influence political decisions from the shadows, from behind the society’s backs. 612 00:43:56,920 --> 00:43:59,840 This group of people must cease to exist. 613 00:43:59,840 --> 00:44:03,080 This was a struggle of life and death, see for yourselves. 614 00:44:03,080 --> 00:44:06,960 They agreed that oligarchs, such as Abramovich and Mordashov, 615 00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:11,780 would donate money to “Petromed”, and “Petromed” would spend it on medicine - 616 00:44:11,780 --> 00:44:14,500 modernizing hospitals, purchasing equipment, and so on. 617 00:44:14,500 --> 00:44:19,760 But! Part of the agreement was that 35% of the donated amount 618 00:44:19,760 --> 00:44:23,880 will go to a special offshore company, with bearer shares. 619 00:44:23,880 --> 00:44:26,180 That is, the owner’s surname is not indicated anywhere, 620 00:44:26,180 --> 00:44:29,380 the company will belong to whoever brings the document. 621 00:44:29,380 --> 00:44:39,420 He offered these oligarchs to participate in some sort of charity programs. 622 00:44:39,420 --> 00:44:45,280 For example, supplying medical equipment. 623 00:44:45,280 --> 00:45:00,520 Shamalov set the condition that 35% of these shipments will need to be kept, so to say. 624 00:45:00,520 --> 00:45:10,200 And then, this is very important, when we were making this decision at the very beginning, 625 00:45:10,200 --> 00:45:16,480 there were no talks at all about this palace, any sort of cash, and so on. 626 00:45:16,480 --> 00:45:22,240 This money was to be spent on investment projects 627 00:45:25,040 --> 00:45:28,540 for the production of medical equipment in Russia. 628 00:45:28,540 --> 00:45:33,800 Shamalov, Gorelov and Kolesnikov himself got 2% of the offshore shares, 629 00:45:33,800 --> 00:45:37,360 and 94% of the shares were given to Putin. 630 00:45:37,360 --> 00:45:41,580 Or “Mikhail Ivanovich”, as the project participants called him for conspiracy purposes. 631 00:45:41,580 --> 00:45:45,200 What’s the origin of this whole “Mikhail Ivanovich” thing? What does it mean? 632 00:45:45,200 --> 00:45:54,940 It was so that we could talk in a company and not say his surname, since it attracts attention. 633 00:45:54,940 --> 00:46:02,000 If people stand nearby and hear you say “Putin”, 634 00:46:02,000 --> 00:46:09,780 they will immediately cock their ears and listen for your every word. 635 00:46:09,780 --> 00:46:15,060 Putin was “Mikhail Ivanovich”, who else was there… Timchenko was… 636 00:46:15,060 --> 00:46:17,600 Timchenko was “Gangrene” 637 00:46:17,600 --> 00:46:19,620 And Kozhin? 638 00:46:19,620 --> 00:46:22,500 Shuvalov was “Professor Preobrazhensky”... 639 00:46:22,500 --> 00:46:26,860 This is actually called a kickback. But Putin called it Rosinvest. 640 00:46:26,860 --> 00:46:29,760 He apparently does not know how to do projects without the prefix ROS. 641 00:46:29,760 --> 00:46:32,660 Initially, it was assumed that Rosinvest would become 642 00:46:32,660 --> 00:46:34,820 something like the president's personal investment fund. 643 00:46:34,820 --> 00:46:38,500 He will take these kickbacks from all these Mordashevs and Abramovichs, 644 00:46:38,500 --> 00:46:43,480 but patriotically invest them in Russian enterprises that are in decline. 645 00:46:43,480 --> 00:46:47,560 And then take credit for it and earn political points. 646 00:46:47,560 --> 00:46:51,720 Oh, I almost forgot! They also agreed that a palace would be built with this money. 647 00:46:51,720 --> 00:46:55,840 There were really some investment projects. But not for long. 648 00:46:55,840 --> 00:46:59,460 After some time, Shamalov, who was the main liaison from Putin, 649 00:46:59,460 --> 00:47:02,520 and the person in whose name the object in Gelendzhik was registered, 650 00:47:02,520 --> 00:47:05,580 ordered to shut down all projects ... except for the palace. 651 00:47:05,580 --> 00:47:13,040 And then they tell us: “We need to shut everything down”. It was during the 2008 crisis. 652 00:47:13,040 --> 00:47:18,420 “We need to shut everything down, because there’s not enough money for the palace” 653 00:47:18,420 --> 00:47:22,160 Well, I said that I won’t be a constructor of the palace. 654 00:47:22,160 --> 00:47:27,840 All Rosinvest's money was to be sent to the construction site of the century in Gelendzhik. 655 00:47:27,840 --> 00:47:32,740 Kolesnikov, who had no plans to devote his life and business to Putin's palace, 656 00:47:32,740 --> 00:47:36,460 writes that very letter and tells the details of what happened. 657 00:47:36,460 --> 00:47:39,400 By that time, several hundred million dollars 658 00:47:39,400 --> 00:47:42,000 had already been spent on the still unfinished palace. 659 00:47:42,000 --> 00:47:47,060 And the total planned estimate was no less than a billion dollars. 660 00:47:47,060 --> 00:47:52,200 A few years later, the story told by Kolesnikov was confirmed by the famous "Panama Papers" 661 00:47:52,200 --> 00:47:56,200 and other investigations, for example, the Reuters agency made a good one. 662 00:47:56,200 --> 00:47:59,100 Do you remember the national project “Health”? 663 00:47:59,100 --> 00:48:04,380 The journalists discovered that our state bought expensive medical equipment 664 00:48:04,380 --> 00:48:06,400 at a price much higher than the market price. 665 00:48:06,400 --> 00:48:09,340 The difference between prices remained with the intermediaries, 666 00:48:09,340 --> 00:48:11,580 who, having passed the money through several companies, 667 00:48:11,580 --> 00:48:17,500 eventually transferred it to the accounts of Lanfranco Cirillo, the Italian architect of Putin's palace. 668 00:48:17,500 --> 00:48:20,900 With the wording “for the construction of an object on the Black Sea”. 669 00:48:20,900 --> 00:48:26,120 So, we literally paid taxes in order to treat those who fell ill with this money. 670 00:48:26,120 --> 00:48:30,080 But they took this money and spent it on Putin's palace. 671 00:48:30,080 --> 00:48:31,400 Thank you very much 672 00:48:31,400 --> 00:48:35,620 On the Internet, you can find several photos of the palace itself. 673 00:48:35,620 --> 00:48:39,460 They’re impressive, of course, and remove all questions about who the owner is. 674 00:48:39,460 --> 00:48:43,440 By the way, here is a detail that struck me personally to the core. 675 00:48:43,440 --> 00:48:48,140 Take a look at this photograph of the gateway of the residence taken by one of the workers. 676 00:48:48,140 --> 00:48:53,380 Something here must seem vaguely familiar to you. You've already seen this somewhere. That's where. 677 00:48:53,380 --> 00:48:59,400 The classic, familiar to everyone, scene of the storming of the Winter Palace from the film by Sergei Eisenstein. 678 00:48:59,400 --> 00:49:04,380 You can still see this eagle now if you visit St. Petersburg and approach the Hermitage. 679 00:49:04,380 --> 00:49:10,900 And the fact that Putin put an exact copy of the Tsar's eagle with a crown from the Winter Palace 680 00:49:10,900 --> 00:49:16,700 on the gate of his personal dacha tells us a lot about who this man thinks he is. 681 00:49:16,700 --> 00:49:21,100 But neither this leak, nor the Kolesnikov story, confirmed by dozens of documents, 682 00:49:21,100 --> 00:49:24,340 could stop the construction of the century on the Black Sea coast. 683 00:49:24,340 --> 00:49:27,360 If Putin wants a palace, Putin will get a palace. 684 00:49:27,360 --> 00:49:32,200 To cool down the scandal and distract public attention, they came up with a scheme. 685 00:49:32,200 --> 00:49:36,080 The palace was “bought” by businessman Alexander Ponomarenko. 686 00:49:36,080 --> 00:49:39,540 He is a long-time partner of Putin's judo friends Rotenbergs - 687 00:49:39,540 --> 00:49:44,080 he deals with real estate and co-owns Sheremetyevo airport with them. 688 00:49:44,080 --> 00:49:48,740 Ponomarenko gave several interviews, where he said “yes, I bought it for myself. 689 00:49:48,740 --> 00:49:52,060 I will build a hotel here" And he even confirmed to reporters 690 00:49:52,060 --> 00:49:56,380 that he bought the palace from Shamalov for about $ 350 million. 691 00:49:56,380 --> 00:50:00,040 He also mentioned that he registered the purchase to his Cypriot offshore company. 692 00:50:00,040 --> 00:50:03,560 We open the financial statements of this offshore company to verify. 693 00:50:03,560 --> 00:50:07,460 We find the required 2011 and see that there was indeed a purchase. 694 00:50:07,460 --> 00:50:10,560 But the palace was bought not for 350 million dollars, 695 00:50:10,560 --> 00:50:14,020 but for 350 thousand dollars, or 10 million rubles at that rate. 696 00:50:14,020 --> 00:50:18,360 That’s the price of a two-bedroom apartment on the outskirts of Moscow. 697 00:50:18,360 --> 00:50:23,980 So, this is an absolutely fictitious deal, they did not even bother to transfer real money, 698 00:50:23,980 --> 00:50:30,060 they simply appointed a special rich man who will be considered the owner of the palace near Gelendzhik. 699 00:50:30,060 --> 00:50:34,720 From the moment Ponomarenko took over the honorary position of the nominal owner, 700 00:50:34,720 --> 00:50:38,500 nothing has changed in terms of management of the palace. 701 00:50:38,500 --> 00:50:43,860 It’s just that before, Shamalov was the owner of the palace, and now he became its manager. 702 00:50:43,860 --> 00:50:48,140 After Shamalov, some kind of company called "Investstroy" began to manage the palace. 703 00:50:48,140 --> 00:50:54,020 To an uninitiated person, this should have indicated that there was no connection with Putin at all. 704 00:50:54,020 --> 00:51:01,660 Its director is a certain Bolat Zakaryanov, and the owners are Tatyana Kuznetsova and Inna Kolpakova. 705 00:51:01,660 --> 00:51:07,040 The offshore company to which the palace was registered was represented by a man named Ivan Serditov. 706 00:51:07,040 --> 00:51:12,600 Who are all these people... We look at their biographies and everything becomes crystal clear. 707 00:51:12,600 --> 00:51:16,420 Bolat Zakaryanov was the director of the palace's management company, 708 00:51:16,420 --> 00:51:21,800 and now, by Putin's decree, he was appointed head of the main public catering department 709 00:51:21,800 --> 00:51:24,200 of the Presidential Property Management Department. 710 00:51:24,200 --> 00:51:29,620 Tatyana Kuznetsova is the wife of Oleg Kuznetsov, then the current chief 711 00:51:29,620 --> 00:51:33,180 of military unit 1473 of the federal security service, 712 00:51:33,180 --> 00:51:37,220 which participated in the construction of the palace as a “customer-developer”. 713 00:51:37,220 --> 00:51:40,080 Now this military unit has been renamed into a more understandable 714 00:51:40,080 --> 00:51:43,900 "Department for the Operation of Property of the State Security Bodies". 715 00:51:43,900 --> 00:51:47,060 Inna Kolpakova is the wife of Alexander Kolpakov, 716 00:51:47,060 --> 00:51:51,440 then the head of the “V” department of the Russian President's Security Service. 717 00:51:51,440 --> 00:51:57,120 The tasks of this unit include the construction and management of the residences of the head of state. 718 00:51:57,120 --> 00:52:00,060 Now Alexander Kolpakov is the Chief Executive Officer 719 00:52:00,060 --> 00:52:03,020 of the President of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. 720 00:52:03,020 --> 00:52:09,720 Ivan Serditov is a young lawyer who at that time worked for Egorov, Puginsky, Afanasiev & Partners. 721 00:52:09,720 --> 00:52:14,880 Hmm... Egorov ... do you remember him? This is the same Nikolai Egorov, Putin's classmate, 722 00:52:14,880 --> 00:52:17,940 who later got him a place at the mayor's office under Sobchak. 723 00:52:17,940 --> 00:52:23,920 Now Serditov is the head of the legal department of the Presidential Property Management Department. 724 00:52:23,920 --> 00:52:28,460 And a little bonus, just so you understand how beneficial it is to keep Putin's secrets. 725 00:52:28,460 --> 00:52:34,660 Here, on the embankment in Gelendzhik, in 2015, four 1000 m2 houses were built side by side. 726 00:52:34,660 --> 00:52:37,180 One was received by the manager Tatyana Kuznetsova, 727 00:52:37,180 --> 00:52:38,920 the second - by Kolpakov's father-in-law, 728 00:52:38,920 --> 00:52:41,700 the third - by the architect of the palace Lanfranco Cirillo, 729 00:52:41,700 --> 00:52:45,600 and the fourth and largest belongs to the son of Bolat Zakaryanov. 730 00:52:45,600 --> 00:52:51,060 So no matter how much we get told that this object belongs to a certain businessman, this is a blatant lie. 731 00:52:51,060 --> 00:52:54,340 Houses of businessmen don’t have no-fly zones over them, 732 00:52:54,340 --> 00:52:58,060 they are not built by FSO officers and not guarded by FSB officers. 733 00:52:58,060 --> 00:53:02,400 The sea is not closed in front of the houses of businessmen, even for fishing boats. 734 00:53:02,400 --> 00:53:09,520 No one can have the slightest doubt that this is Putin's palace. Let's move on to the interiors! 735 00:53:09,520 --> 00:53:14,200 This is certainly not just a building, it is a symbol of the 20 years of Putin's rule: 736 00:53:14,200 --> 00:53:18,780 how it looks, how it is hidden, who pays for it, and even the fact 737 00:53:18,780 --> 00:53:22,760 that it has been under construction for 15 years and they still cannot finish it. 738 00:53:22,760 --> 00:53:28,520 Just imagine, you have an unlimited amount of money, all the power and any resources. 739 00:53:28,520 --> 00:53:31,660 How do you use it? We know many different examples. 740 00:53:31,660 --> 00:53:35,320 The richest people in the world often donate their fortune to charity. 741 00:53:35,320 --> 00:53:39,840 Or build a university. Or a huge hospital that will be named after them. 742 00:53:39,840 --> 00:53:44,600 What dream is Putin realizing? What for did he arrange all this - 743 00:53:44,600 --> 00:53:48,200 20 years in power, repressive laws, robbed poor people, 744 00:53:48,200 --> 00:53:52,660 complete destruction of politics, rewritten constitution, people in prison? 745 00:53:52,660 --> 00:53:59,460 We will now see the answer. For gold and marble, for sofas and couches in the Louis XIV style, 746 00:53:59,460 --> 00:54:04,800 for mosaics, frescoes, stained glass windows, a home theater and even an aquadiskotheque. 747 00:54:04,800 --> 00:54:07,920 I promised you that we will visit Vladimir Putin. 748 00:54:07,920 --> 00:54:11,180 And we will do so, despite the fact that no one invited us there. 749 00:54:11,180 --> 00:54:15,540 One of the important contractors who worked on the arrangement of the palace will help us. 750 00:54:15,540 --> 00:54:19,320 He was so stunned and enraged by the luxury of the decoration 751 00:54:19,320 --> 00:54:25,400 and the insane prices of furniture that he sent us a detailed architectural plan of this object. 752 00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:32,300 It has everything - from a drawing of floor patterns 753 00:54:32,300 --> 00:54:35,980 to the SKUs of all pieces of furniture and the placement of outlets. 754 00:54:35,980 --> 00:54:41,480 So, you and I will literally see what kind of sofas Vladimir Putin sits on, 755 00:54:41,480 --> 00:54:45,180 what beds he lies on, at what tables he eats. 756 00:54:45,180 --> 00:54:50,460 Look at the basement floor, there is a huge swimming pool, a spa area, a massage room, 757 00:54:50,460 --> 00:54:56,860 a beauty salon, some kind of spa capsule. Saunas, hamams, plunge tubs and bathing bowls. 758 00:54:56,860 --> 00:55:01,120 From the pool you can get to the street - to the place that is indicated on the plan 759 00:55:01,120 --> 00:55:05,020 as an aquadiskotheque. I honestly didn't know such things existed. 760 00:55:05,020 --> 00:55:07,720 This is the place on the plan, and here is its photograph. 761 00:55:07,720 --> 00:55:11,760 Something like a fountain where you can sit and order drinks from the bar. 762 00:55:11,760 --> 00:55:16,560 And believe me, this is not yet the biggest surprise that awaits us at Putin's dacha. 763 00:55:16,560 --> 00:55:23,120 There are dozens of outbuildings here, you can't do without them when you live the life of a real monarch. 764 00:55:23,120 --> 00:55:28,860 Rooms for staff - doctors, managers, cooks. Dressing rooms for waiters, 765 00:55:28,860 --> 00:55:34,620 meat and fish workshop, vegetable workshop, bakery workshop, egg processing workshop. 766 00:55:34,620 --> 00:55:38,440 This one’s good - an 18 m2 "mud warehouse". 767 00:55:38,440 --> 00:55:42,920 Obviously, President Putin needs a lot of dirt for a comfortable life. 768 00:55:42,920 --> 00:55:47,080 Well, from more traditional things, there is a “cocktail lounge” from which you can enter 769 00:55:47,080 --> 00:55:52,440 either the home cinema or the tasting room and wine cellar. Wonderful. 770 00:55:52,440 --> 00:55:55,540 On the ground floor, there is a gym with tatami mats. 771 00:55:55,540 --> 00:56:00,300 Nearby there are a lot of interesting rooms such as a reading room or a musical parlor. 772 00:56:00,300 --> 00:56:03,280 Do you think Putin learned to play the piano in vain? 773 00:56:03,280 --> 00:56:07,500 No, after a hard presidential day,having taken care of the people, 774 00:56:07,500 --> 00:56:10,960 he plans to come to the musical parlor and play something for the soul… 775 00:56:17,480 --> 00:56:20,640 It is absolutely fair to argue now: you invented all this, 776 00:56:20,640 --> 00:56:24,260 you drew the plans yourself and are showing them to us. 777 00:56:24,260 --> 00:56:27,180 And at his next press conference, Putin himself will declare as usual: 778 00:56:27,180 --> 00:56:34,400 This isn’t an investigation, it’s a legalization of the materials of American secret services 779 00:56:34,400 --> 00:56:40,800 Therefore, before the tour, I must verify everything and prove to you the authenticity of the documents. 780 00:56:40,800 --> 00:56:45,280 I have already said that in 2011, several pictures of the palace interiors, 781 00:56:45,280 --> 00:56:47,940 taken by workers, appeared on the Internet. 782 00:56:47,940 --> 00:56:52,000 When the plans were sent to us, we took them ourselves and began to compare them 783 00:56:52,000 --> 00:56:55,620 with the existing photographs to make sure that this was not a fake. 784 00:56:55,620 --> 00:56:59,740 I already showed you the aquadiskotheque. Here is a photo, here it is on the plan. 785 00:56:59,740 --> 00:57:03,740 But okay, it can be seen from the outside and redrawn. Let's look for something inside. 786 00:57:03,740 --> 00:57:06,140 Here is a photo, it’s clearly from the dining room. 787 00:57:06,140 --> 00:57:09,820 Here you can clearly see tables, chairs and sideboards with monograms. 788 00:57:09,820 --> 00:57:14,560 We easily find this room on the plan. This is the "small dining room", 789 00:57:14,560 --> 00:57:20,200 we look at the name of the furniture indicated in the plan, it says Citterio Atena. 790 00:57:20,200 --> 00:57:25,940 It is, like all the rest of the palace furniture suppliers, a super exclusive Italian furniture house, 791 00:57:25,940 --> 00:57:30,620 selling piece goods strictly on order. It is impossible to google such a set. 792 00:57:30,620 --> 00:57:36,700 So we wrote a letter to Citterio's factory and just asked to send us a catalog. And voila. 793 00:57:36,700 --> 00:57:39,060 The furniture set in the catalog looks like this. 794 00:57:39,060 --> 00:57:43,180 Table, chairs, sideboard - everything is the same as in the photo. 795 00:57:43,180 --> 00:57:48,620 And just to be sure, here's a photo of a worker next to a nightstand. 796 00:57:48,620 --> 00:57:53,300 The pattern is visible on the floor. We are looking for the same one on our plans and find it in the bedroom. 797 00:57:53,300 --> 00:57:57,280 Let's see what kind of nightstand it is. Here is the company name, Pozzolli, and the item number. 798 00:57:57,280 --> 00:58:00,820 We order a catalog from this factory, which is again super exclusive, 799 00:58:00,820 --> 00:58:04,320 they don't even have this furniture on their own website, and again find success. 800 00:58:04,320 --> 00:58:08,540 The nightstand indicated in the plans exactly matches the nightstand in the photo. 801 00:58:08,540 --> 00:58:11,220 Funny thing with this Italian furniture. 802 00:58:11,220 --> 00:58:16,320 We asked to send us photographs of 20 or 30 pieces of furniture that we found on the plans, 803 00:58:16,320 --> 00:58:18,940 and the representatives of the factory were at some point very surprised - 804 00:58:18,940 --> 00:58:22,500 they asked if we had ordered exactly the same set 805 00:58:22,500 --> 00:58:27,220 for the construction of a palace on the Black Sea. We said yes, we ordered it. 806 00:58:27,220 --> 00:58:32,360 And here is another Italian family furniture factory, there is also a lot of their items in Putin’s palace, 807 00:58:32,360 --> 00:58:36,660 they casually posted photos of Putin's palace interiors on their website, 808 00:58:36,660 --> 00:58:42,940 as well as a video that says that their clients deserve the most extraordinary interiors, 809 00:58:42,940 --> 00:58:45,240 and then, apparently, shows these clients. 810 00:58:45,240 --> 00:58:50,320 These factories really make super exclusive furniture in such small quantities 811 00:58:50,320 --> 00:58:53,540 that they remember all their customers for decades. 812 00:58:53,540 --> 00:58:58,280 The prices are corresponding, here are a couple of real pieces of furniture from Putin's interiors. 813 00:58:58,280 --> 00:59:03,520 Such a leather sofa costs 2 million rubles. This dressing table is also worth 2 million. 814 00:59:03,520 --> 00:59:07,220 The sofas that stand in the corridors, apparently for guests, are cheaper, 815 00:59:07,220 --> 00:59:08,620 for example, this one is 1.5 million. 816 00:59:08,620 --> 00:59:13,820 There is also this cool table with a built-in bar worth 4 million corrupt rubles. 817 00:59:13,820 --> 00:59:19,440 Anyway. After making sure that our architectural plans are absolutely accurate and reliable, 818 00:59:19,440 --> 00:59:24,140 we ordered a 3D visualization and recreated all the interiors. 819 00:59:24,140 --> 00:59:28,340 Wherever there are photos, the reconstruction is 100% true to the original. 820 00:59:28,340 --> 00:59:31,460 And where there are none, minor details may differ, 821 00:59:31,460 --> 00:59:34,200 such as the color scheme or the pattern on the wallpaper. 822 00:59:34,200 --> 00:59:36,660 We go into the palace from the main entrance. 823 00:59:36,660 --> 00:59:40,940 Vladimir Putin fancies himself the Russian emperor and behaves accordingly. 824 00:59:40,940 --> 00:59:45,720 An Italian architect built him a palace in the Italian style. A classic palazzo. 825 00:59:45,720 --> 00:59:48,820 The courtyard with a fountain in the center is surrounded by galleries, 826 00:59:48,820 --> 00:59:52,340 as if we are not near Gelendzhik but in Bologna or Florence. 827 00:59:52,340 --> 00:59:56,140 From the courtyard we go into the atheneum, that’s the name of this room. 828 00:59:56,140 --> 00:59:59,820 Here we will see how similar our reconstruction is to the original. 829 00:59:59,820 --> 01:00:03,060 Photos of this room are available on the Internet, so we can compare. 830 01:00:03,060 --> 01:00:09,020 Look, the columns, stucco moldings, chandeliers and frescoes completely match, one hundred percent. 831 01:00:09,020 --> 01:00:12,440 And here are the golden eagles. There are never too many of them. 832 01:00:12,440 --> 01:00:15,800 Vladimir Putin, reading Komsomolskaya Pravda in this room, 833 01:00:15,800 --> 01:00:18,660 must remember that he is the master of Russia. 834 01:00:18,660 --> 01:00:22,860 And here’s where one of the most famous photographs from inside the palace was taken. 835 01:00:22,860 --> 01:00:28,320 A carefree worker lay down on the sofa on which the most august body would later lie. 836 01:00:28,320 --> 01:00:32,640 He should be careful, this sofa is more expensive than his apartment. 837 01:00:32,640 --> 01:00:35,580 We leave the atheneum, we still have many places to visit. 838 01:00:35,580 --> 01:00:40,900 The doors on the right swing open and we find ourselves in a chic marble foyer with a bar. 839 01:00:40,900 --> 01:00:45,280 These are usually found in front of a theater or concert hall. And our guess is right. 840 01:00:45,280 --> 01:00:48,580 Rich people love to have small movie theaters in their homes. 841 01:00:48,580 --> 01:00:52,220 And the President of Russia built a REAL theater at home, 842 01:00:52,220 --> 01:00:56,660 with a huge stage, backstage, dressing rooms and luxury boxes. 843 01:00:56,660 --> 01:01:00,580 I'm not kidding, inside Putin's palace there is a full-fledged theater. 844 01:01:00,580 --> 01:01:05,960 The auditorium is two-story. The three boxes below can be covered with velvet curtains 845 01:01:05,960 --> 01:01:08,860 in case the owner wants a more intimate setting. 846 01:01:08,860 --> 01:01:11,160 On the second floor there are balconies with sofas. 847 01:01:11,160 --> 01:01:14,360 This shows Vladimir Putin's loyalty to traditions. 848 01:01:14,360 --> 01:01:20,380 In tsarist Russia, landowners built serf theaters for themselves, so our president also built one. 849 01:01:20,380 --> 01:01:26,640 Singer Natalia Vetlitskaya spoke about his craving for costume parties and dressing up back in 2011. 850 01:01:26,640 --> 01:01:31,680 Together with other artists, she was invited to a private performance at Putin's residence on lake Valdai, 851 01:01:31,680 --> 01:01:36,740 and to her surprise, she had to perform in front of Putin and 5 of his guests, 852 01:01:36,740 --> 01:01:40,440 who were dressed in tailcoats and costumes from Catherine's times. 853 01:01:40,440 --> 01:01:45,440 The performers were paid with the titles of People's Artists, expensive watches, diamonds 854 01:01:45,440 --> 01:01:49,840 and the most valuable thing - an icon with the president's personal autograph. 855 01:01:49,840 --> 01:01:52,060 What did Putin write on the icon? 856 01:01:52,060 --> 01:01:54,300 “Best regards, Vladimir Putin” 857 01:01:54,300 --> 01:01:59,460 While ordinary Russians make themselves comfortable to enjoy “Wheel of Fortune”, 858 01:01:59,460 --> 01:02:03,120 the lights go out in the theater of the Black Sea palace, the curtain opens 859 01:02:03,120 --> 01:02:07,020 and the national leader enjoys more exquisite pleasures. 860 01:02:07,020 --> 01:02:10,420 Speaking of exquisite pleasures. You know what our president is a fan of? 861 01:02:10,420 --> 01:02:14,260 Believe it or not, he loves hookah. We go to the room 862 01:02:14,260 --> 01:02:17,280 that’s labelled as a hookah bar on the house plan. 863 01:02:17,280 --> 01:02:22,500 Indeed, it looks like the best, most expensive hookah lounge in the city of Makhachkala. 864 01:02:22,500 --> 01:02:27,940 Sofas, tables, dim lights. The perfect atmosphere to discuss budget issues. 865 01:02:27,940 --> 01:02:32,140 Lying among soft pillows, the President and his guests can also enjoy a show. 866 01:02:32,140 --> 01:02:36,280 This hall is also equipped with a small stage, and surprisingly 867 01:02:36,280 --> 01:02:39,560 there is a special elevation with a pole on the stage. 868 01:02:39,560 --> 01:02:43,420 We just can't even imagine why a pole is needed on the stage. 869 01:02:43,420 --> 01:02:47,440 Maybe for a Christmas tree? Or a giant shawarma? 870 01:02:47,440 --> 01:02:50,660 Or maybe for performances in support of the constitution? 871 01:02:50,660 --> 01:02:55,800 If the hookah bar surprised you, you’ll like this even more. 872 01:02:55,800 --> 01:03:01,140 In his letter to Medvedev, Sergei Kolesnikov said that there is a casino inside the palace, 873 01:03:01,140 --> 01:03:05,500 but no one paid attention to these words back then, because it was impossible to imagine 874 01:03:05,500 --> 01:03:09,840 that the President of Russia would build a casino in his personal house. 875 01:03:09,840 --> 01:03:16,440 He must have overexaggerated. But no, the huge private casino really exists. 876 01:03:16,440 --> 01:03:29,820 The project included a casino. But this casino wasn’t for people from the street. 877 01:03:29,820 --> 01:03:32,960 It was just for passing time. 878 01:03:32,960 --> 01:03:36,800 We enter the personal casino of Vladimir Putin. 879 01:03:36,800 --> 01:03:40,040 They are prohibited throughout the rest of the country, but everything is possible here. 880 01:03:40,040 --> 01:03:44,600 Two card tables and, of course, roulette. I wonder what they play for. 881 01:03:44,600 --> 01:03:47,140 They are definitely not interested in simply betting money. 882 01:03:47,140 --> 01:03:50,540 They most likely play for state companies, so don’t be surprised 883 01:03:50,540 --> 01:03:56,440 that all the country's national treasures belong to Putin's friends. He probably just lost them. 884 01:03:56,440 --> 01:04:00,320 From the casino, through the billiard room, we get to the game room. 885 01:04:00,320 --> 01:04:04,620 The first thing that impresses us is that our president is no stranger to simple entertainment. 886 01:04:04,620 --> 01:04:09,660 He loves to dance. A dance machine with a huge screen is installed here. 887 01:04:09,660 --> 01:04:17,260 The rest of the room is filled with slot machines. An own Black Sea Las Vegas for a true patriot. 888 01:04:17,260 --> 01:04:21,080 This room is called “hall of entertaining games”. 889 01:04:21,080 --> 01:04:26,220 Here, one-armed bandits stand next to gilded chairs worth 700,000 rubles each. 890 01:04:26,220 --> 01:04:30,200 And here is probably the most favorite room of the President of Russia. 891 01:04:30,200 --> 01:04:32,540 The place where Putin outplays everyone. 892 01:04:32,540 --> 01:04:38,180 There are no globes and maps of military operations here, but there are toy racing cars. 893 01:04:38,180 --> 01:04:43,640 For his little electric friends, there is a special room the size of a one-room apartment. 894 01:04:43,640 --> 01:04:49,800 Here, on a special track, the main geopolitical strategist of our time performs amazing tricks, 895 01:04:49,800 --> 01:04:55,200 overtakes his rivals at turns and invariably becomes the winner of the big race. 896 01:04:55,200 --> 01:04:59,380 A little embarrassed, we go to the second floor, to the inner sanctum - 897 01:04:59,380 --> 01:05:02,120 the bedroom of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief 898 01:05:02,120 --> 01:05:05,100 and President of Russia Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. 899 01:05:05,100 --> 01:05:08,360 Although, the word "suite" is more appropriate. 900 01:05:08,360 --> 01:05:11,060 Everything here follows the best aristocratic rules. 901 01:05:11,060 --> 01:05:13,520 You don’t just open the door and see the bed. 902 01:05:13,520 --> 01:05:19,060 First comes the first living room with sofas and armchairs, apparently for resting before resting. 903 01:05:19,060 --> 01:05:23,520 And only from here can you get into the boudoir, so we tiptoe inside. 904 01:05:30,520 --> 01:05:38,320 “Crazed emperor” are the words that come to mind when you see this. 905 01:05:38,320 --> 01:05:43,440 Gold, velvet, canopies, but also an obligatory TV opposite the bed, 906 01:05:43,440 --> 01:05:45,920 so as not to miss important news on Channel One. 907 01:05:45,920 --> 01:05:50,500 It was here, in Putin's bedroom, near this nightstand that this photo was taken. 908 01:05:50,500 --> 01:05:52,420 We’re not the only ones who are so indelicate. 909 01:05:52,420 --> 01:05:57,580 From the royal bedchamber you can get into another, extremely private living room, 910 01:05:57,580 --> 01:05:59,400 probably even Sechin has never been here. 911 01:05:59,400 --> 01:06:04,660 There’s one more door, behind it is a wardrobe,and through it you can get into the bathroom, 912 01:06:04,660 --> 01:06:07,560 where there are marble columns around the jacuzzi. 913 01:06:07,560 --> 01:06:10,480 I don’t know how many square meters you need to sleep, 914 01:06:10,480 --> 01:06:15,020 but in the Gelendzhik palace, 260 m2 was allocated for the master's bedroom. 915 01:06:15,020 --> 01:06:18,000 It seems that the moment has come when it's time to say: 916 01:06:18,000 --> 01:06:23,080 “We showed you Putin's palace, his bedroom, casino, aquadiskotheque and toy cars. 917 01:06:23,080 --> 01:06:25,440 Subscribe to our channel and share this video.” 918 01:06:25,440 --> 01:06:28,360 But the thing is that, in fact, his possessions on the Black Sea 919 01:06:28,360 --> 01:06:31,560 are not limited to this palace complex. 920 01:06:31,560 --> 01:06:36,500 “Putin's Palace” is much more than what we have seen and imagined. 921 01:06:40,740 --> 01:06:43,620 Vineyards 922 01:06:43,620 --> 01:06:48,180 Here, in the village of Divnomorskoye, there are 186 hectares of land. 923 01:06:48,180 --> 01:06:53,080 We see only 23 that are used for vineyards, but they’re so beautiful! 924 01:06:53,080 --> 01:06:55,980 The company "Lazurnaya Yagoda" received them in 2010, 925 01:06:55,980 --> 01:06:59,820 and another 150 hectares around them leased by it. 926 01:06:59,820 --> 01:07:02,620 This is a fairly well-known winery, they have a website, 927 01:07:02,620 --> 01:07:07,860 you can see these exact landscapes beautifully shot for advertising brochures. 928 01:07:07,860 --> 01:07:12,940 There is also a photograph of the winery itself, a small factory, very nice, 929 01:07:12,940 --> 01:07:17,660 here it is right before our eyes, its area is 5244 m2. 930 01:07:17,660 --> 01:07:22,840 The building is completely wooden, and classical music plays inside around the clock 931 01:07:22,840 --> 01:07:28,140 for the maturing wine. It is believed that this makes the wine better. 932 01:07:28,140 --> 01:07:33,380 It also has its own helipad measuring 60 by 60 meters. What winery can do without it? 933 01:07:33,380 --> 01:07:37,500 By the way, the site is connected to a secure government line. 934 01:07:37,500 --> 01:07:41,300 I don't know why, but I can imagine that it can be very convenient 935 01:07:41,300 --> 01:07:47,020 when someone on the other end of the line urgently needs a bottle or two. 936 01:07:47,020 --> 01:07:51,120 We fly from the winery and see the fence and the checkpoint inside the facility. 937 01:07:51,120 --> 01:07:54,900 This, as we have already seen from the example of Putin's palace, is a common practice. 938 01:07:54,900 --> 01:08:02,660 It allows to isolate the winery staff from the cottage staff and protect secret objects from prying eyes. 939 01:08:02,660 --> 01:08:07,640 We fly over the vineyards and understand that there is indeed something to hide. 940 01:08:07,640 --> 01:08:12,060 A huge dacha, or "Chateau" as it is called in the documents. 941 01:08:12,060 --> 01:08:16,580 The building has a quirky shape with many balconies and open areas. 942 01:08:16,580 --> 01:08:24,160 The area is 2,389 m2, near it the 3,201 m2 spa complex with a large veranda, 943 01:08:24,160 --> 01:08:27,780 as well as an artificial pond. There are small houses for birds on the pond. 944 01:08:27,780 --> 01:08:32,640 Why does Putin need another dacha 10 km from the huge palace? 945 01:08:32,640 --> 01:08:35,600 One of the project's developers described it to us like this: 946 01:08:35,600 --> 01:08:40,480 "You sit with a glass of red wine and admire the sea views at sunset." 947 01:08:40,480 --> 01:08:42,660 Apparently in the neighboring Praskoveevka, 948 01:08:42,660 --> 01:08:47,080 where a tasting room was specially cut down in the rock, the sunsets are different. 949 01:08:47,080 --> 01:08:51,980 Together with the palace, these vineyards were sold to Ponomarenko in 2011. 950 01:08:51,980 --> 01:08:56,100 But then came an interesting turn of events. Just 4 months later, 951 01:08:56,100 --> 01:09:01,500 Ponomarenko himself sold them too, to none other than the chairman of the Party of Growth, 952 01:09:01,500 --> 01:09:07,960 business ombudsman, Boris Titov. For the next 6 years, he formally owned these vineyards, 953 01:09:07,960 --> 01:09:15,560 launched wine production, and then returned the chateau and vineyards to Putin's friends in 2018. 954 01:09:15,560 --> 01:09:20,940 It is interesting that all the while Titov was the owner, treated the journalists with “his” wine, 955 01:09:20,940 --> 01:09:24,560 and in general actively pretended that this was his new long-term project, 956 01:09:24,560 --> 01:09:30,000 legally this enterprise continued to be controlled by the management companies known to us 957 01:09:30,000 --> 01:09:37,180 owned by Putin's friend and affiancer Nikolai Shamalov, Tatyana Kuznetsova, Inna Kolpakova and Ivan Serditov. 958 01:09:37,180 --> 01:09:40,540 And what about Titov? 959 01:09:40,540 --> 01:09:44,220 And what about Titov? Titov, too, received some benefit for himself 960 01:09:44,220 --> 01:09:46,040 from participating in this cover operation. 961 01:09:46,040 --> 01:09:50,640 Just a year after his Abrau Durso became the owner of “Lazurnaya Yagoda”, 962 01:09:50,640 --> 01:09:55,180 Vladimir Putin appointed Boris Titov as the business ombudsman by his decree. 963 01:09:55,180 --> 01:10:00,120 Even this position was specially invented for him, so that (Putin’s) business would be protected. 964 01:10:00,120 --> 01:10:06,120 Sure, the business likes to whine sometimes, but still… 965 01:10:06,120 --> 01:10:11,000 To tell our story further, we need to take a close look at this bottle of wine. 966 01:10:11,000 --> 01:10:17,140 It is bottled in this very winery. The label says "exclusive wine, “Usadba Divnomorskoe”, 967 01:10:17,140 --> 01:10:22,380 made according to the best European technologies from grapes grown on the terroir 968 01:10:22,380 --> 01:10:27,840 near the city of Gelendzhik, on rocky slopes descending to the Black Sea coast, 969 01:10:27,840 --> 01:10:30,700 surrounded by a relict pine forest." And here is the manufacturer. 970 01:10:30,700 --> 01:10:34,540 But for some reason it’s not OOO “Lazurnaya Yagoda”, 971 01:10:34,540 --> 01:10:37,260 but another company - AO “Divnomorye”. 972 01:10:37,260 --> 01:10:42,440 And here we find another Putin’s scheme worth many billions of rubles. 973 01:10:42,440 --> 01:10:47,240 The wine is actually not produced by “Lazurnaya Yagoda”, but by this company, “Divnomorye”. 974 01:10:47,240 --> 01:10:51,100 It rents a production building, a 2000-meter warehouse from “Lazurnaya Yagoda”, 975 01:10:51,100 --> 01:10:54,720 grows grapes and sells them under the brand name "Usadba Divnomorskoe". 976 01:10:54,720 --> 01:10:58,380 The business is small, about 150,000 bottles a year 977 01:10:58,380 --> 01:11:02,620 (for comparison, Abrau Durso produces 39 million bottles). 978 01:11:02,620 --> 01:11:10,160 But despite this, in 2018, someone issued an interest-free loan to “Divnomorye” - 7.5 billion rubles. 979 01:11:10,160 --> 01:11:16,500 Someone donated 2.5 annual budgets of Gelendzhik to a tiny winery. 980 01:11:16,500 --> 01:11:23,980 This benefactor, and concurrently the only owner of AO “Divnomorye” was 42-year-old Vladimir Kolbin. 981 01:11:23,980 --> 01:11:26,840 There is nothing remarkable in the biography of this person. 982 01:11:26,840 --> 01:11:30,120 He works as a hired director of the Gelendzhik seaport. 983 01:11:30,120 --> 01:11:33,240 The man is certainly not poor, but he does not look like an oligarch. 984 01:11:33,240 --> 01:11:36,720 Here is his 337 m2 in Gelendzhik, half a kilometer from the sea, 985 01:11:36,720 --> 01:11:41,300 the house was bought a year ago, in December 2019, it’s certainly not a billionaire's palace. 986 01:11:41,300 --> 01:11:45,380 His 214 m2 house in the Leningrad region is even more modest. 987 01:11:45,380 --> 01:11:50,780 Where could he have gotten 7.5 billion from? From his dad. 988 01:11:50,780 --> 01:11:55,680 Vladimir Kolbin is the son of Peter Kolbin, the very childhood friend of Putin, 989 01:11:55,680 --> 01:12:01,580 with whom they went to the village disco together and who later became one of Putin's wallets. 990 01:12:01,580 --> 01:12:05,940 In 2018, Kolbin Sr. died, but it is obvious that his position 991 01:12:05,940 --> 01:12:09,960 as the holder of Putin's money was inherited by his son. 992 01:12:09,960 --> 01:12:16,700 And one more interesting detail. "Usadba Divnomorskoe", a wine from this absolutely unknown, small winery, 993 01:12:16,700 --> 01:12:22,040 in the complete absence of any serious advertising, has a very special status. 994 01:12:22,040 --> 01:12:25,340 I think hardly any of you have tried and seen it. 995 01:12:25,340 --> 01:12:28,940 This is because you, dear spectators, do not go to receptions in the Kremlin. 996 01:12:28,940 --> 01:12:32,980 We found some photos of the menu from the last Kremlin receptions. 997 01:12:32,980 --> 01:12:40,080 Victory Day 2019 - Kamchatka crab salad, scallop and “Usadba Divnomoskoe” chardonnay are served. 998 01:12:40,080 --> 01:12:43,640 Or National Unity Day, look at the menu - the same set. 999 01:12:43,640 --> 01:12:48,800 Putin personally treats his friends and comrade Xi Jin Ping from China with this wine 1000 01:12:48,800 --> 01:12:53,260 and discusses "deeper integration" with Lukashenka while drinking the same chardonnay. 1001 01:12:53,260 --> 01:12:58,560 At first, winemaking was just a status thing for Putin. A chic hobby that emphasizes his status. 1002 01:12:58,560 --> 01:13:02,340 But the desire of others to curry his favor and an unlimited amount of money 1003 01:13:02,340 --> 01:13:07,420 led to the inevitable - the hobby got out of control. Second vineyards were set up, 1004 01:13:07,420 --> 01:13:10,820 which turned out to be even larger and even more expensive 1005 01:13:10,820 --> 01:13:16,240 than those that we have just shown you. And in middle of them, we found a whole super winery. 1006 01:13:16,240 --> 01:13:19,740 The new vineyards are located in the opposite direction from the palace, 1007 01:13:19,740 --> 01:13:21,820 just 9 km away, in the village of Krinitsa. 1008 01:13:21,820 --> 01:13:24,420 In the 19th century, a group of members of “Narodnaya Volya” 1009 01:13:24,420 --> 01:13:27,740 and Tolstoyans with their families moved here and organized a community. 1010 01:13:27,740 --> 01:13:31,160 In 1886, they founded the first vineyards here. 1011 01:13:31,160 --> 01:13:35,980 130 years later, this gentleman from St. Petersburg came to replace the Tolstoyans. 1012 01:13:35,980 --> 01:13:40,280 Nikolai Egorov, who sat at the same desk with Putin at the institute. 1013 01:13:40,280 --> 01:13:45,920 His company, Axis Investments, rented 140 hectares of land right here in 2015. 1014 01:13:45,920 --> 01:13:51,740 Now look at these nasty pictures. Who is this man beaten to a pulp? 1015 01:13:51,740 --> 01:13:55,280 Maybe the leader of a terrorist cell who was detained somewhere in the woods? 1016 01:13:55,280 --> 01:13:59,760 A dangerous bandit? No, this is the famous Krasnodar ecologist Andrei Rudomakha. 1017 01:13:59,760 --> 01:14:03,060 The photo was taken after he was beaten up by unknown people - 1018 01:14:03,060 --> 01:14:05,280 Rudomakha had his skull and nose broken, 1019 01:14:05,280 --> 01:14:07,240 he had chemical burns to his eyes and other injuries. 1020 01:14:07,240 --> 01:14:12,780 This happened after he and his colleagues went to Krinitsa with an environmental inspection. 1021 01:14:12,780 --> 01:14:17,020 Environmentalists went there to film whoever was illegally cutting down the forest there. 1022 01:14:17,020 --> 01:14:22,940 And they found a giant construction site, fences, 6 security posts and a Byzantine-style church there. 1023 01:14:22,940 --> 01:14:26,480 After the attack on Rudomakha, Novaya Gazeta journalists discovered 1024 01:14:26,480 --> 01:14:30,600 that this unusual church was imported from Greece, and this was done 1025 01:14:30,600 --> 01:14:35,260 by the manager of Putin's palace and other vineyards, the wife of the head of the FSO military unit, 1026 01:14:35,260 --> 01:14:40,660 Tatyana Arnoldovna Kuznetsova, whom we have already mentioned many times. 1027 01:14:40,660 --> 01:14:44,400 Journalists even wrote a request to "Axis" demanding a comment 1028 01:14:44,400 --> 01:14:48,540 on what Kuznetsova was doing with them. And they were directly told that Kuznetsova 1029 01:14:48,540 --> 01:14:50,660 was the technical customer of the entire project. 1030 01:14:50,660 --> 01:14:55,580 That is, the person who manages the construction on behalf of the property owner. 1031 01:14:55,580 --> 01:14:59,320 I can repeat this story like a parrot for the third time, 1032 01:14:59,320 --> 01:15:04,960 these vineyards are actually part of Putin's property - the palace was registered for one person, 1033 01:15:04,960 --> 01:15:08,980 the vineyards in Divnomorsk for the second, these ones for the third. 1034 01:15:08,980 --> 01:15:11,920 They’re still managed by the same people. 1035 01:15:11,920 --> 01:15:15,640 Let's rather see from the air what is hidden behind the high fences 1036 01:15:15,640 --> 01:15:19,440 and what new construction of the century is unfolding right now. 1037 01:15:19,440 --> 01:15:25,780 We fly from the Black Sea to the other vineyards of Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin in the village of Krinitsa. 1038 01:15:25,780 --> 01:15:30,360 The three fields in front of you are just a small part of them, only 18 hectares. 1039 01:15:30,360 --> 01:15:32,720 To the right there are two times more. 1040 01:15:32,720 --> 01:15:37,000 All the land around the vineyards is also Putin's, 140 hectares. 1041 01:15:37,000 --> 01:15:40,800 Over there in front we see a huge construction site and fly to see. 1042 01:15:40,800 --> 01:15:45,180 Hundreds of workers are building a super modern huge winery here. 1043 01:15:45,180 --> 01:15:50,100 Some of the builders live in these prefabricated structures, some are brought in by buses every day. 1044 01:15:50,100 --> 01:15:53,660 3 billion rubles are spent annually on this project. 1045 01:15:53,660 --> 01:15:56,940 An incredibly expensive hobby at others’ expense. 1046 01:15:56,940 --> 01:16:02,400 We fly on. The building on the right is one of the two checkpoints, with an area of ​​830 m2. 1047 01:16:02,400 --> 01:16:06,720 The huge gate allows you to drive any trucks through this building. 1048 01:16:06,720 --> 01:16:09,620 A little more to the right is the administrative building. 1049 01:16:09,620 --> 01:16:14,660 We turn around and see the 1208 m2 building of the energy center. 1050 01:16:14,660 --> 01:16:19,760 It is from this building that the entire winery will be supplied with electricity and heat. 1051 01:16:19,760 --> 01:16:25,100 And we find ourselves exactly above the garage for agricultural machinery. 1149 m2. 1052 01:16:25,100 --> 01:16:30,900 We turn a little over the already completely refined territory and see the winery itself. 1053 01:16:30,900 --> 01:16:38,680 According to the documents, its area is 13,762 m2, which is only 4,000 m2 less than Putin's palace. 1054 01:16:38,680 --> 01:16:43,020 The new wine complex, although not completed, already has an official name - 1055 01:16:43,020 --> 01:16:46,220 "Old Provence'' wine-making compound. 1056 01:16:46,220 --> 01:16:51,460 And if at the plant in Divnomorskoye, recordings of classical music are played around the clock for Putin's wine, 1057 01:16:51,460 --> 01:16:58,540 here there is enough room for a whole symphony orchestra, to the envy of the finest Tuscan wines. 1058 01:16:58,540 --> 01:17:01,620 Impressive, right? But now I will impress you even more. 1059 01:17:01,620 --> 01:17:06,020 We found the company that supplies equipment for this winery. 1060 01:17:06,020 --> 01:17:08,220 In their customs declarations, they indicated 1061 01:17:08,220 --> 01:17:13,120 that the items they brought in from abroad were for the Krinitsa winery. 1062 01:17:13,120 --> 01:17:16,940 In total, we found 58 declarations - a drop in the sea of ​​purchases 1063 01:17:16,940 --> 01:17:20,880 during the construction of the plant, but they are striking to the core. 1064 01:17:20,880 --> 01:17:28,020 Conus-shaped tempered glass vase - 30 thousand euros or 2.6 million rubles. 1065 01:17:28,020 --> 01:17:32,700 Pendant chandelier “Gold Moon” with a system of decorative leaves - 2.7 million. 1066 01:17:32,700 --> 01:17:36,960 Fabric sofa with twenty pillows - over 3 million. 1067 01:17:36,960 --> 01:17:41,920 Coffee table with melted metal finish - 4.3 million rubles. 1068 01:17:41,920 --> 01:17:44,740 A coffee table for the price of a two-room flat in Balashikha. 1069 01:17:44,740 --> 01:17:49,900 I am the richest person not only in Europe, but in the whole world. 1070 01:17:49,900 --> 01:17:56,300 And a few more special items, not so expensive, but perfectly showing us the world in which Putin lives. 1071 01:17:56,300 --> 01:18:02,920 This is an Italian toilet brush for 700 euros or 62 thousand rubles 1072 01:18:02,920 --> 01:18:08,960 and a toilet paper holder for 1038 euros or 92 thousand rubles. 1073 01:18:08,960 --> 01:18:14,800 150 thousand for a brush and a toilet paper holder in one bathroom only. 1074 01:18:14,800 --> 01:18:16,740 And there are, of course, dozens of them. 1075 01:18:16,740 --> 01:18:19,800 And this is not a residential building, not a dacha, this is a factory. 1076 01:18:19,800 --> 01:18:24,160 Putin will not live here, he will sometimes drop in here, walk between the vineyards, 1077 01:18:24,160 --> 01:18:28,620 praise the terroir and say “what a delight”. But in case something happens, 1078 01:18:28,620 --> 01:18:33,540 a brush and a paper holder for 150 thousand rubles will be waiting for him in the toilet. 1079 01:18:33,540 --> 01:18:35,840 The annual pension of the average Russian pensioner 1080 01:18:35,840 --> 01:18:40,060 is in one of Putin's latrines, which he may never enter. 1081 01:18:40,060 --> 01:18:43,720 We will be able to annually increase the old-age pensions 1082 01:18:43,720 --> 01:18:48,320 for non-working pensioners by an average of 1000 rubles 1083 01:18:48,320 --> 01:18:50,900 But the winery is not limited to this. 1084 01:18:50,900 --> 01:18:55,580 The company Axis Investments has a twin - “Apex Yug” and we discovered 1085 01:18:55,580 --> 01:19:01,160 that it owns another 150 hectares of vineyards two kilometers west of Divnomorskoe. 1086 01:19:01,160 --> 01:19:07,060 Thus, the total area of ​​Putin's hobby has grown to 530 hectares. 1087 01:19:07,060 --> 01:19:09,760 And one more thing before we go to far from Krinitsa. 1088 01:19:09,760 --> 01:19:16,360 This section, which we saw during our flight, is leased by a company called “Yuzhnaya Citadel”. 1089 01:19:16,360 --> 01:19:20,580 It is also part of Putin's Black Sea empire. The defense part. 1090 01:19:20,580 --> 01:19:24,000 This company is engaged in the cultivation of oysters and mussels. 1091 01:19:24,000 --> 01:19:28,960 We do not understand why they rent this small plot in Krinitsa with household buildings. 1092 01:19:28,960 --> 01:19:35,200 But we do understand why they are renting this huge offshore plot. And this one. And this one. 1093 01:19:35,200 --> 01:19:37,760 The water area was transferred to the company 1094 01:19:37,760 --> 01:19:39,900 under the obligation to breed oysters and mussels there, 1095 01:19:39,900 --> 01:19:44,260 but not a single mollusk, judging by their annual report, went on sale. 1096 01:19:44,260 --> 01:19:46,640 However, under the pretext of this oyster farm, 1097 01:19:46,640 --> 01:19:49,440 people can be prohibited from approaching the palace by water. 1098 01:19:49,440 --> 01:19:53,860 And just for the mention of this oyster farm, the oligarch Mikhail Prokhorov 1099 01:19:53,860 --> 01:19:57,820 dispersed the leadership of the RBK Media, which he owned. 1100 01:20:02,660 --> 01:20:05,160 The Owners 1101 01:20:05,160 --> 01:20:09,120 So. You and I saw a huge bribe that was given to Putin. 1102 01:20:09,120 --> 01:20:12,600 Now there is very little left - to figure out who paid it 1103 01:20:12,600 --> 01:20:16,720 and how our president for life formalizes his secret assets. 1104 01:20:16,720 --> 01:20:22,080 We have thousands of bank transactions, contracts, powers of attorney, registration documents, 1105 01:20:22,080 --> 01:20:24,300 and stories from those who worked at this construction site. 1106 01:20:24,300 --> 01:20:29,540 This is more than enough for us to a) prove that the palace and vineyards 1107 01:20:29,540 --> 01:20:33,420 are a single legal and financial system - the same people pay for everything. 1108 01:20:33,420 --> 01:20:38,460 And b) to demonstrate how Putin's slush fund works - people pool some money, 1109 01:20:38,460 --> 01:20:45,240 it goes to special firms, gets mixed, and then is spent on entertaining the national leader. We will see how. 1110 01:20:45,240 --> 01:20:49,720 We'll start with who owns it all. More precisely, to whom it is registered. 1111 01:20:49,720 --> 01:20:55,400 Respect where it’s due, given that the local people refer to this place only as Putin's palace, 1112 01:20:55,400 --> 01:20:57,500 the level of secrecy is impressive. 1113 01:20:57,500 --> 01:21:00,580 Here is the winery in Divnomorskoye, here are the vineyards in Krinitsa, 1114 01:21:00,580 --> 01:21:05,300 here are some more vineyards not far from Divnomorsk, the oyster farm, and the palace. 1115 01:21:05,300 --> 01:21:10,620 All of them are registered to specially created joint stock companies, into which money is pumped. 1116 01:21:10,620 --> 01:21:16,640 These joint-stock companies hide their owners and all 5 formally unrelated companies 1117 01:21:16,640 --> 01:21:22,500 have chosen one registrar - TsUR - Center for Accounting and Registration in St. Petersburg. 1118 01:21:22,500 --> 01:21:28,740 This company is a specially created pocket registar controlled by Putin's friend Kovalchuk. 1119 01:21:28,740 --> 01:21:34,560 It keeps information about the real shareholders of all our Gelendzhik companies, 1120 01:21:34,560 --> 01:21:39,840 as well as all other well-known assets of the Kovalchuks - Rossiya Bank, National Media Group, etc. 1121 01:21:39,840 --> 01:21:43,020 This Kovalchuk’s registrar was created specifically 1122 01:21:43,020 --> 01:21:46,060 so that it was impossible to say exactly what belongs to whom. 1123 01:21:46,060 --> 01:21:49,960 Therefore, we need to prove it in other ways - using accounting reports, 1124 01:21:49,960 --> 01:21:52,820 annual reports, powers of attorney, and so on. 1125 01:21:52,820 --> 01:21:55,280 We expand our scheme further. Vineyards. 1126 01:21:55,280 --> 01:21:58,860 We have already established that AO “Divnomorye” belongs to Kolbin. 1127 01:21:58,860 --> 01:22:02,260 “Lazurnaya Yagoda”, which owns the vineyards and the Chateau, 1128 01:22:02,260 --> 01:22:06,120 belongs to the non-profit partnership “Development of Agrarian Initiatives”. 1129 01:22:06,120 --> 01:22:11,300 This is a special fund owned by the same Kolbin and our old friend Gennady Timchenko. 1130 01:22:11,300 --> 01:22:14,860 Well, not OUR friend, but Putin's old friend from the 90s. 1131 01:22:14,860 --> 01:22:18,100 “Axis” and “Apex”, along with their toilet brushes 1132 01:22:18,100 --> 01:22:21,760 were also sold to them in 2019 by Putin’s classmate Yegorov. 1133 01:22:21,760 --> 01:22:27,200 For 300 hectares of land, an almost completely built super plant and set up vineyards, 1134 01:22:27,200 --> 01:22:32,240 “Agrarian Initiatives” paid only 60 million rubles to the previous owner Yegorov. 1135 01:22:32,240 --> 01:22:34,020 Here we need to stop for a while 1136 01:22:34,020 --> 01:22:37,520 and explain the meaning of the scheme with this non-profit partnership. 1137 01:22:37,520 --> 01:22:40,680 I hope you remember our film "Don't Call Him Dimon" about Medvedev, 1138 01:22:40,680 --> 01:22:45,360 who also had all his secret dachas registered to non-profit funds. 1139 01:22:45,360 --> 01:22:49,500 Putin uses exactly the same scheme, only he has much more money. 1140 01:22:49,500 --> 01:22:52,880 The point is it’s easier to transfer money to such funds, 1141 01:22:52,880 --> 01:22:55,620 since they are non-commercial and there is no need to pay taxes. 1142 01:22:55,620 --> 01:23:00,280 So, it is actually a wallet, or rather a chest for fundraising, 1143 01:23:00,280 --> 01:23:03,100 and they don't even pretend to be engaged in some kind of activity. 1144 01:23:03,100 --> 01:23:08,060 Let's see. Here is the annual reporting that NPOs are required to submit to the Ministry of Justice. 1145 01:23:08,060 --> 01:23:12,460 This is the report of Kolbin and Timchenko’s “Development of Agrarian Initiatives”. 1146 01:23:12,460 --> 01:23:14,720 As you can see, judging by these figures, 1147 01:23:14,720 --> 01:23:17,700 their agrarian initiatives are unimpressive, or rather nonexistent. 1148 01:23:17,700 --> 01:23:22,940 But if you open the annual financial statements, the picture is completely different. 1149 01:23:22,940 --> 01:23:25,360 Tens of billions in accounts. 1150 01:23:25,360 --> 01:23:29,760 And as we see, they come in the form of “donations'' and “assignments” - 1151 01:23:29,760 --> 01:23:32,860 not only money is donated to the fund, but also shares of companies, 1152 01:23:32,860 --> 01:23:35,000 they receive rights of claim under loan agreements. 1153 01:23:35,000 --> 01:23:37,000 So much money has accumulated on the fund's accounts 1154 01:23:37,000 --> 01:23:42,580 that just interest on deposits brings them 650 million rubles a year. Interest only. 1155 01:23:42,580 --> 01:23:47,880 Timchenko and Kolbin have another such fund that finances the same projects - 1156 01:23:47,880 --> 01:23:52,280 “Development of an efficient investment market”. It's the same story. 1157 01:23:52,280 --> 01:23:57,960 On the accounts of an unknown company with one full-time employee are 21 billion rubles. 1158 01:23:57,960 --> 01:24:03,420 We still have oysters and the palace left. According to the official version, both are owned by Ponomarenko. 1159 01:24:03,420 --> 01:24:08,680 The palace was last re-registered in 2017, when the offshore company Savoyan 1160 01:24:08,680 --> 01:24:11,820 was replaced by the Russian company AO “Binom”. 1161 01:24:11,820 --> 01:24:16,380 The old owner is represented by a certain Natalya Tikhomirova by proxy. 1162 01:24:16,380 --> 01:24:20,980 And the new owner is also represented by Natalya Tikhomirova, she is the director of “Binom”. 1163 01:24:20,980 --> 01:24:24,600 She’s also the director of “Yuzhnaya Citadel”, which is responsible for oysters and defense. 1164 01:24:24,600 --> 01:24:27,240 It's amazing - as if they are selling to themselves. 1165 01:24:27,240 --> 01:24:30,800 In general, there are a lot of amazing things about “Binom”. 1166 01:24:30,800 --> 01:24:36,060 How do you imagine a company that owns the most expensive real estate in the world? 1167 01:24:36,060 --> 01:24:43,280 A company that owns the presidential palace, albeit illegally and fraudulently? Not like this, I bet. 1168 01:24:45,660 --> 01:24:51,240 We are in St. Petersburg, in an ordinary residential area somewhere near the outskirts of the city. 1169 01:24:51,240 --> 01:24:56,220 It is here, in a very modest business center, that “Binom” rents the premises. 1170 01:24:56,220 --> 01:25:03,080 It's right there. Here, behind this window, tens of billions of rubles are spinning. 1171 01:25:03,080 --> 01:25:08,300 Here the company rents a space of less than 10 m2. This is not enough even for one employee. 1172 01:25:08,300 --> 01:25:12,880 They hide the real owner from us, but we can at least look 1173 01:25:12,880 --> 01:25:18,240 who represents his interests at meetings of shareholders. That is, the main person in “Binom”, 1174 01:25:18,240 --> 01:25:23,540 under whose signature all decisions are made. This is a certain Alexander Samosyuk. 1175 01:25:23,540 --> 01:25:28,020 We can also study the powers of attorney to see which lawyers work for “Binom”, 1176 01:25:28,020 --> 01:25:32,000 who can sign its documents. We get a few more names. 1177 01:25:32,000 --> 01:25:36,380 In total, we have compiled a list of 5 managers of “Binom” company, 1178 01:25:36,380 --> 01:25:40,540 director Tikhomirova, a representative of a shareholder, and three lawyers. 1179 01:25:40,540 --> 01:25:46,260 Do you know what unites them all? They are all staff members of another company,“Accept”, 1180 01:25:46,260 --> 01:25:50,000 which belongs to Mikhail Lvovich Shelomov. 1181 01:25:50,000 --> 01:25:55,760 Who is this new character who seems the most important in the scheme of ownership of the palace? 1182 01:25:55,760 --> 01:25:59,680 The hint can be found directly on the official website of Vladimir Putin: 1183 01:25:59,680 --> 01:26:05,960 "Vladimir Putin's mother - Maria Ivanovna Shelomova - was a very gentle and benevolent person." 1184 01:26:05,960 --> 01:26:09,960 Putin's mother, Maria Ivanovna, had a brother, Ivan Ivanovich. 1185 01:26:09,960 --> 01:26:14,560 And Mikhail Shelomov is his grandson, that is, Putin's first cousin once removed. 1186 01:26:14,560 --> 01:26:20,500 Mikhail Shelomov was born in 1968, in the late 80s and 90s he worked on construction sites, 1187 01:26:20,500 --> 01:26:23,200 then got a job as a photographer in a photo studio. 1188 01:26:23,200 --> 01:26:28,680 Shelomov's career was so unsuccessful that he was literally arranged for any job by an acquaintance. 1189 01:26:28,680 --> 01:26:34,080 In 2002, Shelomov was appointed to the state shipping company Sovcomflot. 1190 01:26:34,080 --> 01:26:37,800 Let's listen to the person who directly hired him: 1191 01:26:37,800 --> 01:26:41,260 First of all, tell me: you used to be the head of Sovcomflot, right? 1192 01:26:41,260 --> 01:26:46,140 That’s right, from 2000 to 2004. 1193 01:26:46,140 --> 01:26:52,520 And Shelomov was an employee of Sovcomflot. So, you’ve seen him yourself, right? 1194 01:26:52,520 --> 01:27:00,360 Yes, I was the one who hired him, it was between 2000 and 2001, I don’t remember exactly. 1195 01:27:00,360 --> 01:27:08,080 Alright, since this is a very extraordinary man, please tell me how he ended up there. 1196 01:27:08,080 --> 01:27:14,260 Well, part of my job was solving staff issues. 1197 01:27:14,260 --> 01:27:20,340 Almost every member of the board was taking up somebody’s case in one way or another. 1198 01:27:20,340 --> 01:27:28,040 This included Igor Ivanovich Sechin. He wasn’t on our board, but I met with him, 1199 01:27:28,040 --> 01:27:35,360 And he once asked me to give a job to a man in St. Petersburg. 1200 01:27:35,360 --> 01:27:40,220 I asked if he worked on land or on the ship to know where to appoint him. 1201 01:27:40,220 --> 01:27:43,880 He told me to see for myself and gave me a file with data on this guy. 1202 01:27:43,880 --> 01:27:53,620 I looked through this file and decided to forward it to the head of our St. Petersburg office. 1203 01:27:53,620 --> 01:28:00,260 Let him meet the guy, talk to him and see who it is, maybe he’ll refuse. 1204 01:28:00,260 --> 01:28:06,780 He met him, talked to him, and I received a call from Sechin, 1205 01:28:06,780 --> 01:28:10,600 who asked me whether I gave the guy a job or not. 1206 01:28:10,600 --> 01:28:16,820 We were constructing tankers at the Admiralty Shipyards, 1207 01:28:16,820 --> 01:28:22,480 So he was used in accordance with his professional skills, mostly for photography. 1208 01:28:22,480 --> 01:28:24,480 So, he simply took photos of the ships? 1209 01:28:24,480 --> 01:28:31,560 Not the ships, but the construction process. Plus, he did some minor office work. 1210 01:28:31,560 --> 01:28:37,480 I later thought that I should ask Mikhail why there was such an interest in his person. 1211 01:28:37,480 --> 01:28:42,580 First the minister personally asks me about him, then Kozhin… 1212 01:28:42,580 --> 01:28:49,500 So I asked Shelomov: “Mikhail, I need to know for the future what to expect and how to react, 1213 01:28:49,500 --> 01:28:51,780 so please give me some explanation who you are” 1214 01:28:51,780 --> 01:28:57,280 He then told me in secret that he is a close relative of Putin. 1215 01:28:57,280 --> 01:29:02,320 And at the same time, at the very beginning of the 2000s, during Putin’s first term, 1216 01:29:02,320 --> 01:29:06,240 Shelomov, who lived very modestly, began to grow fabulously rich. 1217 01:29:06,240 --> 01:29:11,220 The very same “Accept” company was given shares in Putin's pocket bank Rossiya bank 1218 01:29:11,220 --> 01:29:13,680 and the largest Russian insurance company Sogaz. 1219 01:29:13,680 --> 01:29:16,700 Even back then, it was hundreds of millions of dollars. 1220 01:29:16,700 --> 01:29:20,080 Shelomov was to be considered one of the richest people in the country. 1221 01:29:20,080 --> 01:29:24,680 But all this time he continued to work as an ordinary hired employee in Sovcomflot, 1222 01:29:24,680 --> 01:29:28,080 worked in the office and lived in a modest townhouse on the outskirts of St. Petersburg. 1223 01:29:28,080 --> 01:29:31,840 He still lives there. After all, his wealth does not belong to him; 1224 01:29:31,840 --> 01:29:36,080 he’s just a nominal owner of what Putin stole or received in the form of bribes. 1225 01:29:36,080 --> 01:29:40,100 Remember the recent news before the new year? A Kyrgyz boy wrote a letter to Putin, 1226 01:29:40,100 --> 01:29:43,320 like Santa Claus, and asked for Gazprom shares as a gift. 1227 01:29:43,320 --> 01:29:48,420 Putin noticed this letter, they made a whole news feed out of it, everyone laughed touchingly, 1228 01:29:48,420 --> 01:29:52,720 and unfortunately they gave the boy not shares, but Tula gingerbread and a portrait of Putin. 1229 01:29:52,720 --> 01:30:05,040 A New Year’s gift for Rustam from the President of Russia Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin! 1230 01:30:05,040 --> 01:30:07,420 A Tula gingerbread and a thermocup. 1231 01:30:07,420 --> 01:30:10,840 Father Frost presented the gift from the Presidential Administration, 1232 01:30:10,840 --> 01:30:15,160 As well as the president’s portrait with his autograph and the wish to study well. 1233 01:30:15,160 --> 01:30:17,720 He could, in principle, give the boy a share or two, 1234 01:30:17,720 --> 01:30:20,500 since he has an abundance of these shares in his family. 1235 01:30:20,500 --> 01:30:25,500 We found out that Putin's cousin Shelomov, through the same “Accept” company, 1236 01:30:25,500 --> 01:30:33,220 owns 39 million shares of Gazprom (this is about 0.2% of all its shares), 1237 01:30:33,220 --> 01:30:36,820 the market value of which exceeds 8 billion rubles, 1238 01:30:36,820 --> 01:30:41,440 and just this already brings Shelomov about half a billion rubles a year. 1239 01:30:41,440 --> 01:30:48,500 In 2018, he received 650 million from the company. And a Tula gingerbread, I hope. 1240 01:30:48,500 --> 01:30:59,160 I don't wanna be a millionaire, I don't wanna be a billionaire, I wanna be a shareholder of OAO Gazprom 1241 01:30:59,160 --> 01:31:01,680 Having studied this object's 15-year history 1242 01:31:01,680 --> 01:31:05,600 we understand that it does not matter to whom the palace is registered. 1243 01:31:05,600 --> 01:31:10,100 Lots of people have been its owners, but what matters is who manages it. 1244 01:31:10,100 --> 01:31:13,980 And if earlier, until 2017, these were people associated with the FSO 1245 01:31:13,980 --> 01:31:19,880 and the presidential administration, now, the palace is managed by the company of Putin's cousin. 1246 01:31:19,880 --> 01:31:26,260 A close blood relative, to whom Putin's most secret assets have been registered for years. 1247 01:31:30,840 --> 01:31:33,620 The Sponsors 1248 01:31:33,620 --> 01:31:37,500 Now we get to the most interesting part. Who’s paying for all this? 1249 01:31:37,500 --> 01:31:38,920 Remember where we started? 1250 01:31:38,920 --> 01:31:43,400 The main rule of Putin's corruption is to keep money with those you know for a long time. 1251 01:31:43,400 --> 01:31:48,000 We have analyzed more than 100,000 bank transactions of companies and people 1252 01:31:48,000 --> 01:31:54,400 involved in the palace financing scheme and are ready to reveal the names of Putin's main wallets. 1253 01:31:54,400 --> 01:31:58,960 Throughout this video, talking about Putin, I mentioned a bunch of people, 1254 01:31:58,960 --> 01:32:02,080 completely different, who seemingly have nothing to do with each other, 1255 01:32:02,080 --> 01:32:04,160 and now you will understand why they’re all here. 1256 01:32:04,160 --> 01:32:10,160 They all met on the Black Sea coast to pay the world's biggest bribe. 1257 01:32:10,160 --> 01:32:14,540 Here are our companies, already familiar, to which the vineyards and the palace are registered. 1258 01:32:14,540 --> 01:32:17,180 Let's start with vineyards and chateau in Divnomorskoye. 1259 01:32:17,180 --> 01:32:21,900 The company AO “Divnomorye”, which produces wine "Usadba Divnomorskoe" 1260 01:32:21,900 --> 01:32:25,220 received over 8 million rubles from Vladimir Kolbin, 1261 01:32:25,220 --> 01:32:28,180 the son of a childhood friend of Vladimir Putin, Peter Kolbin. 1262 01:32:28,180 --> 01:32:32,920 The company “Lazurnaya Yagoda”, which owns the vineyards and the chateau, 1263 01:32:32,920 --> 01:32:37,500 received the most money from the Russian company “Aratron”, more than 2 billion rubles. 1264 01:32:37,500 --> 01:32:41,060 “Aratron” belongs to the Petersburg businessman Alexander Plekhov. 1265 01:32:41,060 --> 01:32:44,660 This is a very interesting and not at all random character. 1266 01:32:44,660 --> 01:32:48,000 Remember the billions of dollars that were found in the accounts 1267 01:32:48,000 --> 01:32:52,700 of Putin's childhood friend, cellist Roldugin, in the Panama Papers? 1268 01:32:52,700 --> 01:33:00,860 He’s spent almost all the money he’s earned on purchasing musical instruments abroad, 1269 01:33:00,860 --> 01:33:02,860 and he brought them to Russia 1270 01:33:02,860 --> 01:33:06,180 These billions, for some reason, were transferred by state-owned companies and oligarchs, 1271 01:33:06,180 --> 01:33:10,240 and the cellist himself, apparently, had no idea what he owned. 1272 01:33:10,240 --> 01:33:15,680 That is, these are literally Putin's personal billions, his offshore wallets. 1273 01:33:15,680 --> 01:33:20,940 Alexander Plekhov was the manager of these offshore companies, by proxy. 1274 01:33:20,940 --> 01:33:23,660 And another offshore company, which received money 1275 01:33:23,660 --> 01:33:27,600 from the oligarch Mordashov and the Rotenbergs, was registered to Plekhov personally. 1276 01:33:27,600 --> 01:33:30,960 Plekhov’s “Aratron”, by the way, gave money not only to”Lazurnaya Yagoda”, 1277 01:33:30,960 --> 01:33:33,220 but also to “Divnomorye” and “Yuzhnaya Citadel”, 1278 01:33:33,220 --> 01:33:35,560 which was supposed to breed oysters and mussels. 1279 01:33:35,560 --> 01:33:37,800 Plekhov runs his business in St. Petersburg 1280 01:33:37,800 --> 01:33:41,600 together with another Putin’s friend and dacha neighbor, Yuri Kovalchuk. 1281 01:33:41,600 --> 01:33:45,460 Kovalchuk appears in our diagram along with a whole cloud of offshore companies. 1282 01:33:45,460 --> 01:33:49,880 This is a whole web of companies controlled by him that transfers money back and forth. 1283 01:33:49,880 --> 01:33:54,140 These offshore companies are also used to finance personal assets of the Kovalchuk brothers, 1284 01:33:54,140 --> 01:33:56,620 such as houses in Gelendzhik and the Leningrad region, 1285 01:33:56,620 --> 01:34:02,520 planes, helicopters, and many other assets that are attributed to both Kovalchuk and Putin. 1286 01:34:02,520 --> 01:34:04,960 The offshore company “Forstis” stands out here: 1287 01:34:04,960 --> 01:34:09,760 it also gave money to both “DIvnomorye” and oysters, but most of it, 1.5 billion, 1288 01:34:09,760 --> 01:34:13,300 went to “Lazurnaya Yagoda”. It was also mentioned in the Panama Papers. 1289 01:34:13,300 --> 01:34:18,680 With its help, Roldugin's firms transfered money from offshore companies back to Russia, 1290 01:34:18,680 --> 01:34:20,960 to the Russian account of this company. 1291 01:34:20,960 --> 01:34:25,460 But this is not all the money at the expense of which “Lazurnaya Yagoda” exists and grows grapes. 1292 01:34:25,460 --> 01:34:29,800 They are also maintained by the state corporation Rosneft and Putin’s main protégé, 1293 01:34:29,800 --> 01:34:33,320 who once carried his briefcase during his days at the St. Petersburg mayor's office, 1294 01:34:33,320 --> 01:34:37,040 and now for some reason is considered great and terrible - Igor Ivanovich Sechin. 1295 01:34:37,040 --> 01:34:41,660 A lease agreement has been signed between “Lazurnaya Yagoda” and a subsidiary of Rosneft, 1296 01:34:41,660 --> 01:34:47,000 according to which the state corporation pays the winery 40 million rubles per month 1297 01:34:47,000 --> 01:34:49,000 for the rent of God knows what. 1298 01:34:49,000 --> 01:34:53,280 “Lazurnaya Yagoda” simply has nothing that could be worth that kind of money. 1299 01:34:53,280 --> 01:34:58,920 Right now you can rent an office with an area of ​​13742 m2 for this money, 1300 01:34:58,920 --> 01:35:02,120 several upper floors in a skyscraper in Moscow City. 1301 01:35:02,120 --> 01:35:05,880 In total, “Lazurnaya Yagoda” received almost 2 billion rubles 1302 01:35:05,880 --> 01:35:09,320 from state company Rosneft with such fictitious lease payments. 1303 01:35:09,320 --> 01:35:14,520 We stop here because this is the most important part of the scheme that needs to be processed. 1304 01:35:14,520 --> 01:35:19,100 There are companies owned by two billionaires - Timchenko and Kolbin, 1305 01:35:19,100 --> 01:35:21,820 they themselves have already put so much money into these companies 1306 01:35:21,820 --> 01:35:25,560 that they cannot spend it anymore and simply put it on a deposit in a bank. 1307 01:35:25,560 --> 01:35:31,040 And still, billionaire Kovalchuk, cellist Roldugin and the state company Rosneft 1308 01:35:31,040 --> 01:35:35,260 are throwing even more money there. Why? 1309 01:35:35,260 --> 01:35:39,760 Because before us is the legendary Putin’s slush fund. 1310 01:35:39,760 --> 01:35:43,840 It’s just like in the books you read about thieves in law. 1311 01:35:43,840 --> 01:35:49,260 Putin's businessmen pay tribute to their boss, who spends this money at his own discretion. 1312 01:35:49,260 --> 01:35:52,220 Moving on. The other vineyards and plant, in Krinitsa. 1313 01:35:52,220 --> 01:35:54,720 They are being built with the money of several people. 1314 01:35:54,720 --> 01:36:00,420 First of all, Gennady Timchenko, Putin's business partner from the 90s, gave 3.3 billion. 1315 01:36:00,420 --> 01:36:04,780 And another 3 billion was given by Putin’s school friend Nikolai Yegorov. 1316 01:36:04,780 --> 01:36:07,160 I have already mentioned him many times in this video, 1317 01:36:07,160 --> 01:36:10,520 you might get the impression that Yegorov is some kind of big oligarch. 1318 01:36:10,520 --> 01:36:13,840 No, Egorov is a lawyer, he is a partner in a law firm. 1319 01:36:13,840 --> 01:36:18,320 Considering that Egorov's entire fortune is estimated at 5 billion, 1320 01:36:18,320 --> 01:36:21,760 it turns out that he spent more than half of what he’s earned in his entire life 1321 01:36:21,760 --> 01:36:27,180 on a winery in Krinitsa. And then he sold it for 50 million rubles. 1322 01:36:27,180 --> 01:36:32,140 But having given money for the vineyards personally on his own, Yegorov did not stop there. 1323 01:36:32,140 --> 01:36:35,220 Remember the story about Putin’s university friends? 1324 01:36:35,220 --> 01:36:39,660 Along with Yegorov, there were Ilgam Ragimov and Viktor Khmarin. 1325 01:36:39,660 --> 01:36:46,080 In 2015, these three created the company "Investment Solutions" in St. Petersburg. 1326 01:36:46,080 --> 01:36:52,180 And this company also gave another 2 billion loan for a super plant in Krinitsa. 1327 01:36:52,180 --> 01:36:55,280 But this is not the biggest expense of the company of Putin's university friends. 1328 01:36:55,280 --> 01:37:00,860 In 2019, “Investment Solutions” gave 2.4 billion rubles to “Binom”, the owner of the palace. 1329 01:37:00,860 --> 01:37:05,280 And then in 2020, another 2.6 billion, so, 5 billion in total. 1330 01:37:05,280 --> 01:37:10,180 Alas, this money was not enough for the reconstruction and the new underground hockey complex. 1331 01:37:10,180 --> 01:37:17,180 “Binom” also received almost as much, 4.3 billion, from our first hero, 1332 01:37:17,180 --> 01:37:20,400 Putin's colleague in the Dresden KGB, Nikolai Tokarev. 1333 01:37:20,400 --> 01:37:25,860 Or rather, not from Tokarev himself, but from the state company Transneft that he heads. 1334 01:37:25,860 --> 01:37:28,900 The same scheme as for Rosneft and “Lazurnaya Yagoda”. 1335 01:37:28,900 --> 01:37:31,900 A fictitious lease, but on a much larger scale. 1336 01:37:31,900 --> 01:37:35,340 Transneft subsidiaries transfer 120 million a month 1337 01:37:35,340 --> 01:37:39,280 to the account of the palace in Praskoveevka. 120 million. 1338 01:37:39,280 --> 01:37:44,240 Since Transneft is still completely state-owned, they have to make excuses 1339 01:37:44,240 --> 01:37:50,220 for spending such huge sums of money to rent an amphitheater in the village of Praskoveevka. 1340 01:37:50,220 --> 01:37:53,740 Therefore, the head of the company, Nikolai Tokarev, comes here once a year 1341 01:37:53,740 --> 01:37:58,220 to take a photo and pretend that he is holding some kind of working meetings here. 1342 01:37:58,220 --> 01:38:02,300 Only these meetings are not held in the atheneum or in a musical parlor, 1343 01:38:02,300 --> 01:38:08,200 but here - in a specially built camp for staff. Or here, Tokarev gets filmed on the helipad. 1344 01:38:08,200 --> 01:38:14,020 Sure, this is a non-trivial approach to organization of work, which is what we do. 1345 01:38:14,020 --> 01:38:16,480 Many processes had to be run parallely… 1346 01:38:16,480 --> 01:38:20,140 He arrives, poses for the camera, pays the money and leaves. 1347 01:38:20,140 --> 01:38:24,500 In total, 4.3 billion rubles were transferred from the structures of Transneft 1348 01:38:24,500 --> 01:38:27,860 to the account of the company that owns the palace over 3 years. 1349 01:38:27,860 --> 01:38:33,960 Thus, state-owned Transneft is one of the largest sponsors of the construction of Putin's palace. 1350 01:38:33,960 --> 01:38:37,580 Over the past 3 years, only according to the most conservative estimates 1351 01:38:37,580 --> 01:38:42,100 and very incomplete data that we have at our disposal, 35 billion rubles 1352 01:38:42,100 --> 01:38:46,140 have been transferred to the accounts of the palace and vineyards. 1353 01:38:46,140 --> 01:38:49,400 This is the money that is being spent right now on reconstruction, 1354 01:38:49,400 --> 01:38:54,620 on the construction of the winery and on the daily maintenance of this huge economy. 1355 01:38:54,620 --> 01:39:01,640 And we’re not counting the billion dollars that had already been invested in construction by 2017. 1356 01:39:01,640 --> 01:39:06,940 Thus, if you ask for the total price of Putin's palace near Gelendzhik, 1357 01:39:06,940 --> 01:39:10,220 the answer to this question will not be easy to give, because such objects - 1358 01:39:10,220 --> 01:39:15,240 with tunnels carved into the rocks and underground hockey rinks - are simply not for sale. 1359 01:39:15,240 --> 01:39:20,020 But we can estimate the minimum cost - how much money was spent on it. 1360 01:39:20,020 --> 01:39:27,380 In total, it’s already 100 billion rubles. That is why we call it the world's biggest bribe. 1361 01:39:27,380 --> 01:39:32,040 Putin's friends, who received from him the right to steal whatever they wanted in Russia, 1362 01:39:32,040 --> 01:39:37,480 thanked him a lot, but in particular, they chipped in, collected 100 billion rubles 1363 01:39:37,480 --> 01:39:40,560 and built a palace for their boss with this money. 1364 01:39:45,720 --> 01:39:47,900 The Women 1365 01:39:47,900 --> 01:39:52,900 Take another look at this diagram. Sure, it looks complicated 1366 01:39:52,900 --> 01:39:56,440 even for such a difficult undertaking as the secret construction 1367 01:39:56,440 --> 01:39:59,000 of the world's most expensive palace with vineyards. 1368 01:39:59,000 --> 01:40:04,440 But what if I told you that this is just a small part of what really exists? 1369 01:40:04,440 --> 01:40:11,060 Several dozen more companies, offshore and not, that pay for other secret assets 1370 01:40:11,060 --> 01:40:16,020 of Putin and his family using the same money and the same people can be added to the scheme. 1371 01:40:16,020 --> 01:40:21,580 After all, the needs of our humble president are not at all limited to the Black Sea palace. 1372 01:40:21,580 --> 01:40:24,840 What about the relatives? You do not expect that they, 1373 01:40:24,840 --> 01:40:29,080 like some ordinary people, will live on a salary? Everyone needs a place to live. 1374 01:40:29,080 --> 01:40:33,400 Everyone needs a plane. Everyone needs a yacht. All this must be paid for. 1375 01:40:33,400 --> 01:40:37,760 This means that we need a financial scheme and people who will fill this scheme with money. 1376 01:40:37,760 --> 01:40:40,800 This slush fund, the basis of which we have described to you, 1377 01:40:40,800 --> 01:40:44,500 is used by Putin in order to cover the expenses of family members. 1378 01:40:44,500 --> 01:40:48,420 The larger the family, the more the expenses, and Putin - 1379 01:40:48,420 --> 01:40:54,820 as befits a person who imagines himself a monarch - has a rich and eventful personal life. 1380 01:40:54,820 --> 01:41:01,580 Just recently, Proekt Media told us a wonderful story from the life of this deeply religious person, 1381 01:41:01,580 --> 01:41:04,140 the guardian of millennial conservative values. 1382 01:41:04,140 --> 01:41:09,020 It turns out that a certain Svetlana Krivonogikh lives in St. Petersburg. 1383 01:41:09,020 --> 01:41:15,180 Once she was just a pretty young girl, but now she has turned into an incredibly rich woman, 1384 01:41:15,180 --> 01:41:18,460 a shareholder of Rossiya Bank. And no one can understand 1385 01:41:18,460 --> 01:41:23,340 how such happiness fell on Krivonogikh, who once worked as a cleaner. 1386 01:41:23,340 --> 01:41:24,520 Here’s the answer. 1387 01:41:31,780 --> 01:41:37,700 Krivonogikh met Putin in the late 90s, and in 2003, according to Proekt, 1388 01:41:37,700 --> 01:41:39,920 she gave birth to his daughter Elizaveta. 1389 01:41:50,980 --> 01:41:56,420 A few months after that, she became the owner of a 447 m2 apartment, 1390 01:41:56,420 --> 01:42:01,220 having received it from Kovalchuk and other friends of Putin from the “Ozero” dacha cooperative. 1391 01:42:01,220 --> 01:42:04,800 Then there were more apartments, again from Putin's old friends. 1392 01:42:04,800 --> 01:42:08,860 For example, this 197 m2 apartment, 300 meters from the Hermitage, 1393 01:42:08,860 --> 01:42:11,480 was given to the Krivonogikhs by Oleg Rudnov, 1394 01:42:11,480 --> 01:42:17,680 whom the Kommersant newspaper called Putin's friend back in 2005, along with Kovalchuk 1395 01:42:17,680 --> 01:42:20,960 After Krivonogikh gave birth to Putin's child, a bunch of assets 1396 01:42:20,960 --> 01:42:24,400 (including a 3% stake in Rossiya Bank) were registered for her, 1397 01:42:24,400 --> 01:42:29,460 and they are financed from the same scheme that we described to you. 1398 01:42:29,460 --> 01:42:34,000 For example, her companies “Ozone” and “Pulse” receive money from “Accept”. 1399 01:42:34,000 --> 01:42:36,660 “Ozone” owns the Igora resort in the Leningrad region, 1400 01:42:36,660 --> 01:42:40,440 and “Pulse” owns the 40-meter yacht of Svetlana Krinovogikh. 1401 01:42:40,440 --> 01:42:44,800 The offshore company “Forstis”, which gave money for the vineyards in Divnomorskoye, 1402 01:42:44,800 --> 01:42:48,700 also issued loans to another Krivonogikh’s company, “Profit”. 1403 01:42:48,700 --> 01:42:52,960 This company owns the "Leningrad Center" in the Tauride Garden in St. Petersburg. 1404 01:42:52,960 --> 01:42:55,940 Therefore, we can confirm the investigation of Proekt. 1405 01:42:55,940 --> 01:42:58,600 There can be no random women in this scheme. 1406 01:42:58,600 --> 01:43:03,340 This is another example of how Putin's friends steal from the entire country, 1407 01:43:03,340 --> 01:43:07,840 and as a token of gratitude they support Putin's mistress and her child. 1408 01:43:07,840 --> 01:43:10,380 Putin's personal life concerns only him. 1409 01:43:10,380 --> 01:43:13,720 He can even have 20 families if he desires, it’s none of our business. 1410 01:43:13,720 --> 01:43:15,860 We pay attention to something else. 1411 01:43:15,860 --> 01:43:19,940 His tumultuous relationship is paid for by bribes and corruption. 1412 01:43:19,940 --> 01:43:25,500 Get this - there are 20 million beggars in the country, and he buys a yacht for his mistress. 1413 01:43:25,500 --> 01:43:30,080 Forget the yacht, though. Both the yacht and Krivonogich’s apartments look like a trifle 1414 01:43:30,080 --> 01:43:32,760 compared to the funding of the famous gymnast 1415 01:43:32,760 --> 01:43:36,960 and the woman with the most incomprehensible status in Russia, Alina Kabaeva. 1416 01:43:36,960 --> 01:43:41,660 I don’t think it will surprise you if I say that I like them all 1417 01:43:41,660 --> 01:43:45,700 In 2008, a whole newspaper “Moskovsky Korrespondent” was closed down 1418 01:43:45,700 --> 01:43:49,120 because it wrote an article about the relationship between Putin and Kabaeva. 1419 01:43:49,120 --> 01:43:52,400 This is a forbidden topic for everyone, but the truth does not change from this. 1420 01:43:52,400 --> 01:43:57,400 Billions of stolen money are being spent on supporting another woman of Putin. 1421 01:43:57,400 --> 01:44:02,620 We see from the documents that Alina Kabaeva is inseparable from our scheme. 1422 01:44:02,620 --> 01:44:08,180 Alina Kabaeva's grandmother got a 212-meter apartment in St. Petersburg from Gennady Timchenko. 1423 01:44:08,180 --> 01:44:12,600 4 days before that, another person involved in our scheme, or rather his father, 1424 01:44:12,600 --> 01:44:18,320 transferred to the same grandmother two neighboring apartments on the Arbat, 300 m2 each. 1425 01:44:18,320 --> 01:44:23,920 In August 2013, businessman Grigory Baevsky, who can also be called Rotenbergs’ nominee, 1426 01:44:23,920 --> 01:44:28,620 like Ponomarenko, handed half a hectare of land on Rublyovka 1427 01:44:28,620 --> 01:44:32,340 and 2 houses on it (1454 and 1722 m2) to Kabaeva’s grandmother. 1428 01:44:32,340 --> 01:44:36,200 And after 5 years, the neighboring land plot was bought by Kabaeva herself. 1429 01:44:36,200 --> 01:44:41,160 I mean, a former gymnast has been appointed the country's chief media manager. 1430 01:44:41,160 --> 01:44:44,540 She is the chairman of the board of directors of National Media Group. 1431 01:44:44,540 --> 01:44:48,020 This structure belongs to the main holder of Putin's money, Kovalchuk. 1432 01:44:48,020 --> 01:44:51,660 She owns almost half of the major media outlets in Russia. 1433 01:44:51,660 --> 01:44:55,160 And there is no dispute: Alina Maratovna Kabaeva is the best in the world 1434 01:44:55,160 --> 01:44:58,920 at jumping with a ball and a ribbon, but she would not have been able 1435 01:44:58,920 --> 01:45:03,960 to manage television companies and newspapers if not for her connection with Putin. 1436 01:45:10,140 --> 01:45:17,820 After all, just her official salary from Kovalchuk in 2018 was 785 million rubles. 1437 01:45:17,820 --> 01:45:23,520 But do not think that Alina Maratovna and her relatives only receive these apartments and money. 1438 01:45:23,520 --> 01:45:29,260 They give back too. Here is a touching document we found. A real document of the era. 1439 01:45:29,260 --> 01:45:32,900 This is a registry extract for a relatively small apartment in Sochi. 1440 01:45:32,900 --> 01:45:36,740 Alina's grandmother bought it in 2011. And six years later, 1441 01:45:36,740 --> 01:45:40,620 the apartment became the property of Mikhail Shelomov, a relative of Putin. 1442 01:45:40,620 --> 01:45:44,020 Consolidation of joint property is underway, so to speak. 1443 01:45:44,020 --> 01:45:48,280 That is, the registry extract for this apartment is the only document in history so far 1444 01:45:48,280 --> 01:45:52,580 where both families - of Alina Kabaeva and of Vladimir Putin - appear together. 1445 01:45:52,580 --> 01:45:57,680 Today, I have confidence in my future. I will go to the elections on December 2 1446 01:45:57,680 --> 01:46:05,520 and vote for “United Russia” and the person who gave me this confidence, Vladimir Putin. 1447 01:46:05,520 --> 01:46:09,580 However, the life of a polygamist brings not only pleasure, but also problems. 1448 01:46:09,580 --> 01:46:14,100 And the song known to everyone in our country, seems to be directly dedicated to Vladimir Putin. 1449 01:46:14,100 --> 01:46:17,260 Remember: "Three wives are wonderful, what you can say, 1450 01:46:17,260 --> 01:46:19,880 But on the other hand - I've got three mothers-in-law!” 1451 01:46:19,880 --> 01:46:23,620 That's not so bad to have three wives, 1452 01:46:23,620 --> 01:46:27,240 But it's much worse on the other hand! 1453 01:46:27,240 --> 01:46:31,760 After all, Putin also has three mother-in-laws. At least three. Fortunately for our national leader, 1454 01:46:31,760 --> 01:46:36,800 he has what the heroes of the film "Kidnapping, Caucasian Style" lacked: Gazprom. 1455 01:46:36,800 --> 01:46:40,800 Gazprom used to have a subsidiary called “Teplo Invest”. 1456 01:46:40,800 --> 01:46:45,500 Formally, it was engaged in operating all sorts of small boiler houses, pipes, cable lines. 1457 01:46:45,500 --> 01:46:48,800 A small structure, it doesn't even exist anymore, it was liquidated. 1458 01:46:48,800 --> 01:46:55,100 But somehow, before liquidation, this company bought several super-elite apartments 1459 01:46:55,100 --> 01:46:58,060 in the most expensive part of Moscow, the Ostozhenka area. 1460 01:46:58,060 --> 01:47:03,140 In 2014, “Teplo Invest” became the owner of a 260 m2 apartment 1461 01:47:03,140 --> 01:47:08,620 in this building on Prechistenka and 220 m2 one in this one, in Molochny Pereulok. 1462 01:47:08,620 --> 01:47:11,580 These are very, very expensive apartments. 1463 01:47:11,580 --> 01:47:15,700 And within a year after the purchase, one of the apartments, the more expensive one, 1464 01:47:15,700 --> 01:47:19,620 went to the mother of Alina Kabaeva, Lyubov Mikhailovna Kabaeva, 1465 01:47:19,620 --> 01:47:22,840 and the second, a little more modest one - to the mother of Svetlana Krivonogikh. 1466 01:47:22,840 --> 01:47:27,880 Remember what Gazprom says in its ads? National treasure. 1467 01:47:27,880 --> 01:47:29,620 I think they need to change the slogan. 1468 01:47:29,620 --> 01:47:34,360 Gazprom: Using the national treasure to support Putin's mother-in-laws! 1469 01:47:34,360 --> 01:47:39,880 The great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy once very clearly described the structure of power in Russia: 1470 01:47:39,880 --> 01:47:42,240 The villains who robbed the people gathered together, 1471 01:47:42,240 --> 01:47:46,160 recruited soldiers and judges to guard their orgy, and are feasting. 1472 01:47:46,160 --> 01:47:52,140 This brilliant phrase still precisely describes what is happening in our country. 1473 01:47:52,140 --> 01:47:56,840 The villains robbed the people. They recruited judges, the National Guard and FSB officers 1474 01:47:56,840 --> 01:48:01,180 to guard their palaces, while they themselves sit and play in their personal casinos, 1475 01:48:01,180 --> 01:48:03,880 surrounded by wives, mistresses and children. 1476 01:48:03,880 --> 01:48:07,260 And they will never voluntarily leave power. 1477 01:48:07,260 --> 01:48:11,100 The stupidest phrase that you often hear sounds like this: 1478 01:48:11,100 --> 01:48:13,220 “Well, these have already stolen enough. 1479 01:48:13,220 --> 01:48:16,160 Leave them be, or new ones will come and start stealing again”. 1480 01:48:16,160 --> 01:48:20,060 You can clearly see that there’ll never have enough. On the contrary. 1481 01:48:20,060 --> 01:48:26,540 More money is constantly needed. Even if your salary is raised from 30 to 45 thousand rubles, 1482 01:48:26,540 --> 01:48:29,060 it’s still not enough for you. It’s the same with them. 1483 01:48:29,060 --> 01:48:34,160 Buy this yacht, buy this apartment. The palace was built, but the pipe burst, it needs to be redone. 1484 01:48:34,160 --> 01:48:37,120 And the contractor asks for more. And the children are growing up. 1485 01:48:37,120 --> 01:48:40,580 And everyone needs their own house. And then Putin's daughter gets married 1486 01:48:40,580 --> 01:48:43,900 and her husband must be made the youngest billionaire in Russia, 1487 01:48:43,900 --> 01:48:47,400 otherwise she will make a scene. And the eldest daughter also has a husband. 1488 01:48:47,400 --> 01:48:51,020 And Krivonogikh's daughter is already an adult, soon a separate yacht will be needed. 1489 01:48:51,020 --> 01:48:54,680 And then the grandchildren will grow up. And everyone has colossal appetites. 1490 01:48:54,680 --> 01:48:58,080 And that's just Putin. But there’s still Medvedev, and all the ministers, 1491 01:48:58,080 --> 01:49:02,260 and these Millers, Rothenbergs, Kovalchuks and Timchenkos. 1492 01:49:02,260 --> 01:49:06,280 They will never have enough. On the contrary, they will steal more and more. 1493 01:49:06,280 --> 01:49:13,000 Until the whole country is ruined. Russia is still selling oil, gas, metals, fertilizers, timber 1494 01:49:13,000 --> 01:49:16,960 in huge quantities, and the income of the population keeps declining. 1495 01:49:16,960 --> 01:49:20,920 Because Putin has a palace, and Kabaeva, and Krivonogikh. 1496 01:49:20,920 --> 01:49:25,100 And each smaller official has his own palace and his own Kabaeva. 1497 01:49:25,100 --> 01:49:31,920 We will live normally only when we stop tolerating officials who steal and re-electing them. 1498 01:49:31,920 --> 01:49:34,360 And if they refuse to hold fair elections, 1499 01:49:34,360 --> 01:49:38,860 then we’ll take to the streets and remove them from power in this way. 1500 01:49:38,860 --> 01:49:41,600 This is what distinguishes poor countries from rich ones. 1501 01:49:41,600 --> 01:49:45,560 In rich countries, people take to the streets at the slightest indignation, 1502 01:49:45,560 --> 01:49:49,860 and officials are afraid of this. In poor countries, people tolerate all this, 1503 01:49:49,860 --> 01:49:54,180 and officials hold referendums to extend their powers. 1504 01:49:54,180 --> 01:49:58,660 And they say: wait a little longer. We've only been in power for 20 years. 1505 01:49:58,660 --> 01:50:03,440 Just look at what they do. Every day there are new laws prohibiting criticism of the authorities. 1506 01:50:03,440 --> 01:50:07,080 All who are dissatisfied are foreign agents. It is already forbidden 1507 01:50:07,080 --> 01:50:11,880 to even campaign for candidates in the elections that you like and criticize “United Russia”. 1508 01:50:11,880 --> 01:50:16,880 Putin and his group of thieves want life-long and uncontrolled power. 1509 01:50:16,880 --> 01:50:21,440 We have reached the point where it is no longer a group of people who rob the state, 1510 01:50:21,440 --> 01:50:24,940 but the state itself has turned into an instrument of theft. 1511 01:50:24,940 --> 01:50:28,740 The FSO and National Guard guard the palaces. The judges jail the dissatisfied. 1512 01:50:28,740 --> 01:50:31,220 The FSB has created a group of murderers 1513 01:50:31,220 --> 01:50:34,540 whose task is simply to kill those who refuse to remain silent. 1514 01:50:34,540 --> 01:50:38,880 But the good news is that there are still many, many more of us. 1515 01:50:38,880 --> 01:50:43,400 Putin and everyone who guards him, steals for him, falsifies elections for him - 1516 01:50:43,400 --> 01:50:48,100 these are several hundred thousand people. And there are tens of millions of us. 1517 01:50:48,100 --> 01:50:50,160 We just do not believe in our strength. 1518 01:50:50,160 --> 01:50:55,080 If everyone who watches this video shares it, we will tear the censorship to shreds. 1519 01:50:55,080 --> 01:51:00,380 If 10% of the disaffected take to the streets, they will not dare to falsify the elections. 1520 01:51:00,380 --> 01:51:04,980 If each of us registers and participates in the “Smart Voting”, 1521 01:51:04,980 --> 01:51:10,140 then Putin's party of theft and degradation “United Russia” will lose the elections, 1522 01:51:10,140 --> 01:51:16,140 political competition will begin and the quality of politics and officials will begin to improve. 1523 01:51:16,140 --> 01:51:19,020 Fair courts and normal prosecutors will appear. 1524 01:51:19,020 --> 01:51:22,520 Stealing on such a scale as now will become impossible. 1525 01:51:22,520 --> 01:51:26,060 And step by step, we will start living better and richer. 1526 01:51:26,060 --> 01:51:30,580 All we have to do is stop being patient. Stop waiting. 1527 01:51:30,580 --> 01:51:35,500 Stop wasting your life and your taxes on enriching these people. 1528 01:51:35,500 --> 01:51:42,180 Our future is in our hands. Do not be silent. Don't agree to obey the feasting villains. 1529 01:51:42,180 --> 01:51:45,420 Subscribe to our channel, we tell the truth here. 1530 01:51:45,420 --> 01:51:49,740 Help us share this investigation. They won’t show this on TV 1531 01:51:49,740 --> 01:52:05,060 Thanks to everyone who investigates Putin’s corruption 1532 01:52:05,060 --> 01:52:08,500 The Anti-Corruption Foundation was labelled as a foreign agent. 1533 01:52:08,500 --> 01:52:12,120 We don’t agree with this. This was done to obstruct our activities 1534 01:52:12,120 --> 01:52:23,980 Support us: donate.fbk.info 1535 01:52:23,980 --> 01:52:30,000 Investigation and screenplay: Alexey Navalny, Maria Pevchikh, Georgy Alburov 1536 01:52:30,000 --> 01:52:37,160 [30] Video production: Kira Yarmysh, Alexandra Dubrovskaya, Vitaly Kolesnikov, Alexander Lebedinsky, Yaroslav Mudryakov 1537 01:52:37,160 --> 01:52:39,160 [37] Art director: Varvara Mikhailova 1538 01:52:39,160 --> 01:52:43,640 [39] IT decisions: Vyacheslav Romantsov