Against the eccentric businessman Mikhail Gutseriev imposed sanctions-due to close friendship with Lukashenko

He was on his secret inauguration and carried propagandists from Russia to Belarus

Russian billionaire Mikhail Gutseriev (60th in the Russian Forbes list with a fortune of $ 2.5 billion) on June 21 was included in the sanctions list of the European Union against Belarus , adopted in connection with the landing in Minsk Ryanair and the arrest of oppositionist Roman Protasevich. Now Gutseriev’s assets in the EU will be frozen, he is forbidden to enter the European Union and transit through them, and citizens and EU companies are forbidden to finance it. We tell you what Gutseriyev is known in Russia - and how it is connected with Belarus.

He lost Russian business twice - and twice restored positions

The head of one of the richest families of Russia ( according to Forbes ) Mikhail Gutseriev is a versatile and very stubborn person. He had already endured the defeat in business twice, but restored his position. For several years he was the president of the Russian-Belarusian oil and gas company Slavneft, in 2002 he tried to defend her before privatization and for two months he kept desperate battles ( in the literal sense )-but lost.

Having lost Slavneft, Gutseriev managed to collect from disparate assets his own oil company Russneft, but he also lost it in 2007 (he had to sell Oleg Deripaska under pressure) and was forced to flee to London from criminal prosecution. However, Gutseriev committed the impossible - he came up with the authorities, bought the “Russneft” from Deripaska and returned to Russia three years later.

Composes poetry and owns radio

Since then, his passion besides business and oil has become the composition of poems, he is the author of many songs of famous pop artists and the owner of seven musical radio stations (including Radio Chanson, Radio Dacha, Hit FM), united in Krutoy Media holding named Producer Igor Krutaya.

The largest Russian investor in Belarus

In the EU magazine, Gutseriev is called "a famous Russian businessman who has business interests in Belarus in areas such as energy, potassium fertilizers, hotel business and others." Gutseriev himself talked about his investments in Belarus back in 2017 - he invested 180 million dollars of “personal money” into the country. Among the assets, he called the Renaissance Minsk hotel, a terminal at the airport, a business center in Minsk and a recreation center in Krasnoselsky (where Lukashenko often rests ).

By that time, the company Gutseriev, Slavykaliy, had already begun the largest investment project in Belarus for the production of potassium fertilizers - worth two billion dollars (of which the Chinese development bank finances 1.4 billion).

Rusneft and Neftisa, controlled by the businessman through his family holding Safmar, supply oil to Belarus. These companies, the only from Russian, continued the supply of oil to the Belarusian refineries during the energy crisis between Belarus and Russia in early 2020 - it was said to justify sanctions against Gutseriev.

The Gutseriev family is actively investing in the Belarusian IT sector. For example, the son of Mikhail, Said Gutseriev, invested in the first legal crypto -country in the CIS. And Mikhail Gutseriev himself is called one of the fathers of the “Belarusian IT revolution”, which convinced Lukashenko to begin “ construction of IT Strans” .

Lukashenko’s personal friend and formal owner of one of his residences

The EU magazine says that Gutseriev is a longtime friend of Alexander Lukashenko; The Belarusian president defended him when a criminal case was instituted against him in Russia. The businessman presented Lukashenko luxurious gifts, and he thanked Gutseriev for "charity and multi -billion dollar investments in Belarus."

“He [Gutseriev] also stated that he is the owner of the residence, which de facto belongs to Lukashenko, thereby covering him when the journalists began the investigation of Lukashenko’s assets,” the EU document says. We are talking about the Krasnoselskoye estate near Minsk - it is often used by Alexander Lukashenko, but it was built on the ground rented by Gutseriev, and cost him $ 40 million - in his own words .

The Russian businessman was present at the secret inauguration of Lukashenko on September 23, 2020, the EU journal said. And Gutseriev helped in August 2020 to deliver and settle in Minsk employees of Russian pro-government media, called by Lukashenko to help due to the dismissal of journalists of state television channels. They flew to Belarus aboard Gutseriev’s plane to replace the deprived employees and settled in the Minsk Renaissance Hotel owned by Gutseriev.

In addition to Gutseriev, the children of Lukashenko, as well as MAZ and BELAZ, fell under the sanctions

In total, in the sanction list of the European Union adopted on June 21, 78 people and eight organizations. The son of Alexander Lukashenko Dmitry and the wife of the other son of Viktor, Lilia Lukashenko, the chairman of the Investigative Committee Dmitry Gora and the Ryanair flight, officials, the Minister of Transport Alexei Avramenko, the director of the Aviation Department, Artem Sikorsky, the Minister of Defense, Viktor Khrenin, and his deputy Golub and his deputy.

Among the Belarusian companies, the sanctions of the European Union are imposed on the MAZ and BelAZ auto company, the New Oil Company and five more organizations, including Belaeronavigation. Their assets in the European Union will be frozen and their financing is prohibited.

Tatyana Lysova