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Cyprus has lengthy drawn criticism for offering offshore monetary companies for folks related to corrupt regimes and companies. A brand new sequence of investigations by the Worldwide Consortium of Investigative Journalists, together with 68 media companions, has uncovered the monetary companies business’s hyperlinks to President Vladimir Putin’s regime.
Among the many revelations is the discovery that German journalist Hubert Seipel obtained lots of of hundreds of {dollars} from an oligarch believed to be near the Kremlin.
Who’s Hubert Seipel?
Seipel is an award-winning filmmaker and creator who has labored for Der Spiegel and Stern journal as a overseas correspondent. For many years he has been seen as certainly one of Germany’s main impartial specialists on Russia.
Central to this has been his entry to Putin, whom he claims to have met “practically 100 instances,” together with for the reason that begin of the warfare in Ukraine. His newest guide describes him as “the one journalist to have direct, private contact with the president.”
When one German writer was being lobbied to supply a translation of my WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT PUTIN, he mentioned it wasn’t wanted as a result of Seipel had “already written all the things on Putin that wanted to be written” and his work was “priceless”
Turns on the market was a worth: €600k… https://t.co/gGXOLCeL8M
— Mark Galeotti (@MarkGaleotti) November 14, 2023
However this entry led to allegations of coziness with the Kremlin. His 2012 documentary “I Putin, a Portrait” was criticized by native media for being a “microphone-holding train.”
In 2021, Seipel was questioned on German radio about whether or not he had “obtained any honoraria” from Russia for his work. Seipel denied that was the case. However leaked paperwork present that he obtained cash from certainly one of Russia’s richest males.
What was the deal?
Seipel has acknowledged receiving cash from offshore accounts linked to the metal and banking magnate Alexei Mordashov. Although he didn’t affirm how a lot he obtained, leaked paperwork from a Cyprus-based monetary companies supplier reveal that previously 5 years, he obtained 600,000 euros ($730,000).
Mordashov is the chairman and largest shareholder of Severstal, the most important metal and mining firm in Russia. In 2022, he was sanctioned by the European Union and Britain for his hyperlinks to Putin and Financial institution Rossiya, which performed a task in destabilizing Ukraine after the 2014 annexation of Crimea.
Paperwork present that the sponsorship was in alternate for writing two books. The Guardian steered these have been Seipel’s 2015 biography “Putin: Interior Views of Energy” and a 2021 guide titled “Putin’s Energy: Why Europe Wants Russia.”
What has Seipel mentioned?
Seipel has mentioned that Mordashov paid him together with his personal cash and the help was “solely meant for the guide initiatives.”
Seipel has defended the legitimacy of his work and denied being “some type of Putin agent.”
Seipel’s writer, Hoffmann und Campe Verlag, mentioned it had “no information” of Mordashov’s sponsorship. “If these [allegations] are true, we reserve the proper to take additional steps, they mentioned in a press release.
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