Russian courts arrested Oleg Deripaska’s assets by a billion dollars after the Kremlin asked the businessman to stop criticizing the war in Ukraine. This is reported by the sources of Financial Times.
The publication drew attention to the legal dispute between the administration of the Sirius federal territory and the company Deripaska Rogsibal, which rented 30 land plots with a total area of more than 13.8 hectares in the cargo area of the port of Sochi.
The dispute arose even before the Russian invasion of Ukraine. However, the sources of the Financial Times claim that the decisions on termination of contracts and the arrest of assets were made after the Kremlin asked Deripaska to stop criticizing the war. As an example of criticism, which the businessman acted, the Financial Times is given by the March Twit Deripaska. “We need peace, since we have already passed the point of no return,” the post says. According to the source of the publication close to Deripaska, after tweet, the Kremlin asked the businessman to “soften criticism” and later repeated this request at least one more time. However, at the end of June, the Russian entrepreneur said that the “colossal mistake will destroy Ukraine,” the newspaper recalls.
Oleg Deripaska spoke about the war in Ukraine several times. Financial Times notes that he never directly criticized the policy of Russian President Vladimir Putin.