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Politics

قِلة متنفذة طيبة، قِلة متنفذة شريرة

Jul 31, 2018 Vladislav Inozemtsev

موسكو ــ في ظل قلق متنام في الولايات المتحدة وأوروبا من ما يسمى بالقلة المنتفعة الحاكمة (الأوليجاركية) في روسيا والأموال التي أخفتها في الخارج، يجدر بنا أن ننظر في مسألتين أساسيتين. الأولى: من الذي تنطبق عليه مواصفات الأوليجاركي؟ والثانية: هل يستحق كل أوليجاركي أن يُنظر إليه بعين الريبة؟

بالنسبة للولايات المتحدة، يمثل الارتياب قطعا القاعدة والأساس، حيث أعلنت سلطاتها عقوبات ثقيلة ضد اثنين من أباطرة المال والأعمال الروس، وهما أوليج ديريباسكا وفيكتور فيكسلبيرج، كجزء من حملة لمعاقبة الكرملين على تدخله المزعوم في الانتخابات الرئاسية عام 2016. كذلك نفذت بريطانيا، في أعقاب الهجوم بغاز الأعصاب على العميل المزدوج الروسي السابق سيرجي سكريبال وابنته في إنجلترا، إجراءات جديدة تهدف إلى منع غسل الأموال، بإخضاع تدفقات رؤوس الأموال القادمة من روسيا لأشد أشكال التدقيق والمراقبة.

وتكمن المشكلة الأساسية في بقاء المعايير التي تستخدمها الحكومات الغربية لتحديد الروس المستوجبين للتحقيق، بل والعقوبة، فضفاضة للغاية. وبحسب أكثر التعريفات شيوعا، يُعرّف الأوليجاركي بأنه شخص تعتمد ثروته على الاتصالات والعلاقات السياسية ــ لا سيما بالرئيس الروسي فلاديمير بوتن. وقد حددت وزارة الخزانة الأميركية 96 شخصا على أنهم "أوليجاركيون" وأدرجتهم على لائحتها المسماة بلائحة بوتن ــ وهي قائمة عقوبات ومراقبة وُضعت في يناير/كانون الثاني الماضي ــ بناء فقط على حقيقة امتلاكهم أكثر من مليار دولار أميركي.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 6 Comments on this article

Karl Barber Aug 4, 2018

Didn’t Putin follow a somewhat similar approach when “bad oligarch” Khodorkovsky with his political ambitions was put in prison? Selective justice is double edged.
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j. von Hettlingen Aug 2, 2018

Vladislav Inozemtsev warns against a generalisation of Russian oligarchs, suggesting Western sanctions against them all may be counterproductive. He urges the West to adopt a “more nuanced approach” to separating the wheat from the chaff and identify those oligarchs who “deserve heightened scrutiny and possibly punishment,” rather than “punishing those Putin considers his enemies.” He believes that “giving oligarchs an incentive to take their money and leave” Russia would be a much more “effective” way to “hurt” Putin’s regime.
In April US Department of Treasury announced massive sanctions against 17 senior Russian government officials, 7 Russian billionaires – including Oleg Deripaska and Viktor Vekselberg – and 12 companies the oligarchs own or control, as part of an effort to punish the Kremlin for its meddling in the 2016 election that helped elect Trump. The sanctioned parties had their assets frozen, and US persons are prohibited from dealings with them.
A month earlier Theresa May promised to retaliate against Russia if there was no adequate explanation for the nerve-agent poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergey Skripal and his daughter. But she had not “implemented new measures” to crack down on Russia’s business ties in the UK, like money laundering, and using the Criminal Finance Act to scrutinise capital flows from Russia and see how premium property in London was acquired.
The author points out how amateurish a sanctions watch list was compiled in January by US Treasury, identifying 96 “oligarchs” based on public resources published by Forbes. In an effort “to identify Russians worthy of investigation and even punishment” US officials define an oligarch as “a person whose wealth depends on political connections and – particularly to Russian President Vladimir Putin.”
There is some truth in this assumption. An oligarch who can make an immense fortune in Russia without feeling harassed or threatened by the authorities must cultivate a good relationship with Putin. Although tycoons like Oleg Deripaska, Vladimir Potanin, Roman Abramovich and Mikahil Fridman made their fortune under Boris Yeltsin, they rely on Putin’s goodwill to thrive.
They and other billionaires like Arkady Rotenberg, Andrey Yakunin, Alisher Usmanov had played their parts in the construction of sports venues for the Sochi Olympics, or the World Cup. They are said to provide other services to the Kremlin. Some finance ultra-right movements; others sponsor anti-EU thinktanks and publications. Some of them may be managing Putin’s secret assets abroad. The ill-gotten all these years could easily make him the richest man on earth.
Those who fell out with Putin fled Russia in order to avoid meeting the same fate as Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who spent 10 years behind bars on “trumped-up fraud and embezzlement charges after funding Putin’s opponents.” The author says Roman Abramovich, Mikhail Prokhorov, and Alexander Lebedev should be treated “differently” from Putin’s veritable cronies, because they had “sold nearly all of their assets in Russia and pursued legal and transparent businesses in the US and the UK.”
It may be unfair that the US administration seeks to “paint all wealthy Russians with the same brush.” Many of them had amassed a huge fortune thanks to snatching up valuable state assets at dirt cheap prices under Boris Yeltsin and being in Putin’s good graces later. The author says “that does not mean they all deserve to be punished equally today.” He names Joachim-Napoléon Murat and Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, who were both Napoleon’s “pawns.” While “Murat stuck by Napoleon (and was ultimately executed for treason), Bernadotte, in his position as King Charles XIV John of Sweden, eventually helped to bring about Napoleon’s defeat.” The problem is that even the “good” oligarchs might choose to stick by Putin, because they fear the uncertainty and instability that arise in a post-Putin Russia.
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Philippe de Lara Aug 1, 2018

M. Inozemtsev analysis is correct and very illuminating. Since the failure of the coup in August 1991, and even more since Putin's access to power… thanks to Yeltsin in 1999, Kremlin has kept reconstituting and reinforcing the KGB-State. Talking about about oligarchs as such, nationalists and westerners, technocrats and ideologues, etc., are out of the mark because they miss the infrastructure of power, the KGB-State. Western government should understand this and target accordingly the sanctions policy. Alas, we are from this, EU, not to mention Trump are weakening, bargaining, with Russia, for instance on NS2, or on readmitting Russia into PACE. There are many other causes of Western pusillanimity, but one of theme is the lack of proper understanding of Putin's regime.
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unmerciful cantala Aug 1, 2018

On the contrary, there is such a thing as a good Oligarch. A good oligarch is one that abides by international ruses of conducting business, protects said business on behalf of the shareholders and treats employees fairly while submitting to inquiries by the state when necessary. In the above list of examples, people like Oleg Deripaska or Roman Abramovich are “good oligarchs” despite repeated attempts to tie them to Putin’s inner circle, because they abide by the rules above. We’re living in an increasingly globalised economy, where people of all nationalities end up owning companies in other countries. We cannot target them on the basis of their nationality without harming our own. So we need to be smarter about whom we label as oligarchs and whether we consider that label to be instantly disqualifying or not.
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Bernhard Kopp Aug 1, 2018

It is highly questionable that there is a 'good oligarch'. The source of the wealth may not in all cases be illegal or criminal, it is almost always illegitimate, since it was acquired in legal and economic environments that allowed 'legal theft'. This applies not only to Russia. Consequently, countries and individuals should be blacklisted and there should be extra transparency and public disclosure requirements. Money laundering is a 'subsidiary crime'. The origin of the money must be identifiable illegal, since the country of origin says so, otherwise it is just money, pecunia non olet.
- Vladislav Inozemtsev Aug 1, 2018
  
  The question is relevant, but rather as a moral judgement. Although, in real life there are nations, and Russia is among them, where one witnesses a kind of a primitive accumulation of capital neglecting all moral norms, and nothing else. So I just argue that if in such a surroundings some individuals are ready to opt out and to start a more civilized business, they should get help from the advanced nations - since they outgrew the society that produced them and may be helpful in changing it. All other solutions may only consolidate the system which is not only incompatible with the modern liberal society, but also hostile to it.
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