While Western governments entertain the illusion that their economic sanctions are actually hurting Russia’s economy, the reality behind the surface is very different. The decisions made by the EU, UK and North America are not coordinated enough and underestimate the ability of cunning Russian oligarchs to elude them, particularly in sectors vital to the global economy such as B. Food.
The question is not just whether oligarchs can still enjoy luxury apartments or huge yachts, although there is plenty of evidence for this: For example, the Tel Aviv suburb of Herzliya has a $65 million mansion by Roman Abramovich and a multi-million dollar home Property of fertilizer entrepreneur Moshe Kantor. Abramovich and Kantor are certainly not sitting in the rubble of their homes, left without water and with erratic electricity due to Russian bombing. The worst consequence they suffer from the war is that the sanctions imposed on them result in a temporary loss of social standing as even unscrupulous charities feel remorse.
The European Jewish Congress had to reluctantly abandon Kantor, who had served three times as Congress President, as had various Holocaust memorial organizations. And the King and Tony Blair are probably not so enthusiastic about Kantor’s donations to their pet causes. But you don’t have to have the ingenuity of a lawyer to turn your holdings into such large corporations that actual ownership seems to vanish. How else would Abramovich have managed to buy a Dutch football team (Vitesse, ed.) if he already owned Chelsea?
Fertilizers are a very big business, valued at $250 billion worldwide. Russia and Belarus are major players in this industry, especially in nitrogen and potassium. Kantor-led fertilizer giant Akron still operates potash mines in Canada, despite its name being on that country’s list of sanctioned oligarchs. In fact, his mine is right on the route that the Canadian military uses to conduct training programs for Ukrainian soldiers.
Joint ventures are another way to avoid sanctions. Rio Tinto Group’s annual report reveals an innocently named partnership – “CanPacific Potash Inc” – developing a $500 million mine in Albany. Although Kantor has transferred its majority stake in Akron to three colleagues, Kantor still owns 40% Company Under UK sanctions prohibit dealing with frozen funds or economic assets owned, owned, held or controlled by a sanctioned person, so what are the UK and Canadian governments doing to stop this leak?
Perhaps Kantor is upset that he can’t visit his multimillion-dollar home in Hampstead Garden Suburb, but nothing has been done to rein in his gains because two governments that support Ukraine are not working together. While we hear a lot about Russia having to divert oil and gas exports to India and China, business in other sectors is still going strong: fertilizers, but also nuclear services.