Vladimir Putin's Secret Riches - Documentary

he's the world leader accused of personally approving murder on the streets of london the conclusion that the russian state was probably involved in the murder of mr litvinenko is deeply disturbing but is the president implicated in an assassination also responsible for theft on an extraordinary scale he has fleets of things that almost no billionaire in the west would have vladimir putin has been accused of looting his own country today putin behaves like a czar tonight we investigate the truth about president putin's riches why would it be kept secret because it belongs personally to putin not to the state and for the first time the americans say what they really think about the russian president is vladimir putin corrupt in our view yes [Music] big there is no other world leader like vladimir putin [Music] action man [Music] [Music] from ukraine to syria vladimir putin's influence is being felt he's faced countless accusations of corruption but still has record approval ratings in russia what do you think of vladimir putin but should the russian people trust vladimir putin [Laughter] [Music] putin himself dismissed the [Music] [Music] but a secret cia report agreed with belkovsky's figure in their view putin was worth around 40 billion dollars did you tell the cia the details of your 40 billion figure i think cia and fbi have got this information separately without my assistance [Music] russia's role in the ukrainian conflict has led to closest scrutiny of putin's finances many of his inner circle have faced financial sanctions from the americans and the european union now the u.s won't publicly confirm the 40 billion figure but they have told panorama what they think about putin's wealth i'm not in a position to give you figures but what i can say is that he supposedly draws a state salary of something like 110 000 a year that is not an accurate statement of the man's wealth and he has long time training and practices in terms of how to mask his actual wealth is vladimir putin corrupt in our view yes how long has the united states known that vladimir putin was in your words a corrupt figure i think for many many years russia dismisses this sort of talk as nonsense but the fact that the americans are finally labeling putin as corrupt shows how bad relations have become so what's the truth about putin's money has russia's president been making billions on the side and if he has where's it all hidden i've come to estonia to meet a man who says he knows about some of putin's cash he fled russia after falling out with kremlin insiders our contact helped putin collect money from the super rich they all thought it was to pay for health care but sergey kelesnikov says some of the donated cash was diverted and ultimately used to help build a billion dollar palace for putin regrettably these funds which were supposed to be invested in decent investment projects to a significant extent ended up being spent on a palace on the black sea coast and here it is [Music] president putin says the palace is nothing to do with him [Music] but we've seen documents linking vladimir putin to the palace at the time it was built they show a secret money trail and it's claimed putin was at the heart of it these are documents from one of the offshore companies that diverted millions of dollars to the palace and according to kelesnikov the owner of this company was putin himself the offshore company was overseen by kelesnikov and his business partner a kremlin insider called nikolai shimalov [Music] shimalov said that he was taking 96 shares 96 keeping two for himself and he would be giving 94 to putin and there's more evidence kelesnikov and shamalov were recorded apparently discussing 440 million dollars of investments belonging to putin they refer to putin using a nickname mikhail ivanovich shamalov is still a trusted kremlin insider and in that recording he was discussing putin's secret fortune finding evidence like that about putin is not easy he used to run russia's intelligence service he knows how to hide secrets [Music] few from his inner circle ever talk but panorama has tracked down one who will i've come to nice in the south of france to meet him so i'm at the hotel and we're about to be picked up and taken to the interview location but the truth is we have no idea where we're going we certainly don't have anything like an address and the reason is probably because the man that we're on our way to interview is on the run he was one of russia's richest and most important men but he fled his homeland and says he can't go back his driver has brought me to a secret location [Music] he says he helped putin become president they were friends their children played together i had a very close relationship with putin putin consulted me putin confided in me pugh took putin to see one of the presidential palaces [Music] of course this was an absolutely new world new life and of course he was astonished by it in that first term as president what was putin's attitude to money i think that putin was preoccupied with the issue of wealth from the start i think that for putin this was an important factor vladimir putin has come a long way he wasn't born rich and to understand him you need to go to his home city saint petersburg [Music] this is where he grew up there on the fifth floor putin's family had one room in a shared apartment no hot water and a shared kitchen in the corridor vladimir putin grew up in poverty but it was in saint petersburg that vladimir putin first tasted power back in the 90s not long out of the kgb putin became a deputy mayor on his watch millions of dollars disappeared from public funds to a company called 20th trust the detective who investigated says putin was one of those who benefited he says putin ended up with the property in torah villa in spain 20th trust is building a villa for putin in torah vieja is this putin personally receiving the money or not in my opinion the answer is straightforward [Music] but the criminal case was closed after putin became president zikov says he was forced into retirement the kremlin has denied the claims but spanish investigators reveal the details of wiretapped phone conversations between russians who've been linked to organized crime they can be heard discussing putin's property in spain one of the gangsters says putin's house is in torah villa the same spanish town zikov had identified it looks like zikoff was right putin got a house in spain so in saint petersburg putin learned how to profit from power he also built a loyal team after he moved to the kremlin they came with him the men closest to putin have been with him for years they're with him here in saint petersburg and they've stayed with him ever since and this is the group that he trusts and that he rewards and this is the group that runs russia putin's lawyer at the town hall became president and then prime minister of russia his former deputy also served as prime minister the chief of staff at the town hall now runs russia's anti-drugs agency his former assistant now runs the biggest oil company in the world and his former economist now runs the biggest gas company in the world all of them worked with putin in this building [Music] they rose up together they went with him to moscow and they have been a very stable elite this whole group who grabbed the commanding heights of the russian economy they all worked together in a very small office in fact in saint petersburg and as president putin was at the center of this new elite he had power and access to the super-rich you can see how putin used this by looking at his relationship with britain's most famous russian chelsea owner roman abramovich now he was one of the unwitting donors to putin's palace he thought all his cash would be spent on health care and he gave more than 200 million dollars [Music] was rather simple he provided 203 million dollars so were these oligarchs effectively just paying tribute to vladimir putin i think this is exactly what they thought [Music] abramovich and other wealthy russians are expected to pay for important projects like hosting the 2018 world cup foreign ladies and gentlemen will be organized in russia but we have been told about a gift that can't be explained away as good for anyone other than vladimir putin a 35 million dollar yacht like this one given by roman abramovich [Music] and our source is the man who managed the yacht he fell out with the kremlin he's a wanted man in russia and he's living in the uk hi dmitry i'm richard yes nice to meet you dimitri skarger says he helped oversee the transfer of the boat from abramovic to putin i was on board of this yield at the end of march 2002 in amsterdam and there was a representative of mr abramovic skarga says the yacht was given to an offshore company but the real owner was president putin vladimir putin visited this yacht definitely now at the autumn of 2002 in sochi this yield was maintained and paid for running costs from state budget why would it be kept secret because it belongs personally to putin not to the state we've seen documents that appear to support skarger's story roman abramovich's lawyers said the claims were unsubstantiated little more than a rehash of speculation and rumors but they didn't specifically deny that he had given president putin a yacht you can hardly blame abramovic for wanting to keep on putin's good side standing up to him can be dangerous [Music] this is billionaire mikhail kodakovsky publicly challenging putin about corruption and this is where he ended up kodakovsky was jailed for tax evasion and embezzlement his business was taken by the russian state the beauty of the system is that it's organized and run according to the old adage for my friends everything from my enemies the law the message that putin chose to send to all of them was that i can put you in prison for anything i don't need to have a watertight case so that is the genius of the system sergey puguchov claims he lost his business too he started a multi-billion dollar compensation claim against the russian state but the russian authorities accuse him of stealing billions of dollars from a bank he used to own there is no court in russia that's why i went to the international court i am convinced that i will win the russian state says that you effectively looted your bank after it was bailed out by the russian central bank did you do that well of course not these are absurd accusations not substantiated by anything we don't know who's telling the truth about purgators fortune but the allegation is clear putin controls the super rich in russia [Music] people who possess a fortune a large business in russia realize that they do not own this because everything depends on putin they depend 100 percent on his mood [Music] for those who've been in putin's circle the benefits have been immense a cellist who is godfather to putin's daughter has a valuable stake in a major russian bank a neighbour has an even bigger stake another neighbor ended up running the railways a childhood friend has made a fortune from government contracts and his brother has made even more the americans say this is how putin's russia works we've seen him enriching his friends his close allies and marginalizing those who he doesn't view as friends using state assets whether that's russia's energy wealth whether it's other state contracts he directs those to whom he believes will serve him and excludes those who don't and if you want to make money in russia this is the industry the nation's greatest riches are in oil and gas russia exports well over a billion barrels of oil a year and here too vladimir putin has been accused of taking a cut for himself putin came he established a system where high-ranked officials actually want to control vital strategic assets what we have now are a bunch of shady guys who barely appear in public and who control vital businesses linked to the state which makes one thing and wonder whether they are real beneficiaries of their business or somebody super powerful is really behind their back [Music] i've come to new york to meet a man who says putin took a slice of his oil business he's yet another russian who's fled abroad he says his life has been threatened this is his first tv interview [Music] max hi i'm richard max friedson started his business in saint petersburg when putin was deputy mayor putin gave him a monopoly to supply oil to the local airport but he says the help came at a price he has now a domestic fortune i know from my business partner that putin asked for a share in the business initially they were asking for 15 he called them greedy bastards he managed to talk them down the kremlin says max's story is untrue but the americans have highlighted another energy company that they say putin has links to it's called gunvor according to the americans putin had secret investments in the company what exactly do you mean by investments uh we believe that it's a place where he's stored money and how much money would you say i can't give you an estimate on that told us these claims were illogical and preposterous conspiracy theories and that president putin does not and never has had any ownership in gunvor the americans insist they're right that they haven't provided any evidence [Music] it's important because gunvore has traded much of russia's state oil it's made big profits and nearly half of the company was owned by this man gennady timchenko one of putin's friends he's now sold his stake it said he's worth 10 billion dollars and he's on the u.s sanctions list the americans claim his activities in the energy sector have been directed by president putin has gennady timchenko been holding wealth of vladimir putin do you think it's uh i don't know if i would put it exactly that way in terms of holding his wealth i can say that he has been tremendously enriched personally by vladimir putin as have another handful of people in putin's inner circle and of course there are allegations suspicions that he holds tremendous amounts of putin's wealth gennady timchenko's lawyers said the u.s has never produced any evidence and its claims were propaganda in which our client is a collateral target mr timchenko categorically denies that president putin has ever controlled his assets or enriched him but two of our sources say mr timchenko was very much under the control of vladimir putin [Music] from mr timchenko himself that you see sometimes he could just pointing up in in talks and saying that is everything is controlled by michael lunch from the very start putin understood that money which tim chenko was managing one way or another without any doubt belonged to putin it was never a secret mr timchenko's lawyers say our two main sources are not credible and may have access to grind president putin denies all the allegations in this program his spokesman declined to answer our absurd questions because the issues we had raised were pure fiction [Music] this all matters because president putin is one of the most powerful people on the planet but he's been accused of using that power to enrich himself on a vast scale [Music] yes natural sports i started arguing with shamalov and he said to me who do you think you are you're a serf the tsar he often called putin the tsar the tsar made a decision your job is that of a serf to deliver some say putin can demand anything he wants so almost any figure for his wealth is meaningless [Music] putin considers everything within the territory of the russian federation everything that can be converted into cash to be his own [Music] how would you describe that kind of wealth describe is a kind of arabic fairy tales so it's just with the fingers sleep and everything is arranged putin has been accused of corruption on an extraordinary scale the modern tsar who plundered his own empire [Music] meeting the nationalists who idolized putin and threatened foreigners reggie yates extreme russia on bbc3 now next year on bbc one scotland unarmed response has far-reaching consequences for the police brand new silent witness [Music]

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Id: egWupVOBlMQ

Length: 27min 58sec (1678 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 07 2018