BTW, Sergei Mikhailov, Semion Mogilevich, Arigon, Magnex Rt et al can be found in numerous places on the internet by just doing a word search through various engines and databases. ( NB Articles appear in English, French, Hungarian, Russian etc. - and with the different forms of spelling of the respective names.) Here's just one of the interesting items anyone can call up - makes one wonder if the mutual fund managers and brokerage analysts do any research on-line! (...what independent research DO they do?!)
Scotland on Sunday
November 26, 1995, Sunday
Western businesses bought as front for Russian mafia
Organised Crime Has Spread Into Central Europe, Writes Gabriel Ronay In Budapest
Crime is paying in Russia's criminal underworld.
In a bid to widen its share of western markets, the Russian mafia has moved its forward money-laundering operational bases to central
Europe, flooding laundered money from criminal activities into the new democracies
Some Russian entrepreneurs, able to draw on hundreds of millions
of dollars from former KGB operational funds salted away in the region, have also secured a slice of the action.
A number of well-established European firms, ranging from hi-tech
electronics to real estate, have been bought up and are operated with Russian mafia money, according to Budapest police sources investigating the Hungarian end of Russian mafia penetration.
Their investigations have been borne out by their colleagues in
Moscow. Last week Izvestia, the influential Moscow newspaper, published a list of central and western European firms allegedly run by - or with - Russian mafia money.
Amongst them are the electronics firm Magnex in Hungary, the
Rosides Establishment of Liechtenstein, the Empire Bond Company of Israel, the Moskau and Spartak Basketball Company of Austria, as well as Maxim, Arbat-International and the SV-Holdings in Russia.
According to both Budapest and Moscow police, one of the key
figures behind the money- laundering is Sergey Mikhailov, alias 'Mikhas'. He travels on a Costa Rican diplomatic passport and has been 'appointed' honorary consul of Puerto Rico in Moscow. He is also the head of Moscow's dominant crime syndicate, the Solntsevo gang, and, exploiting the open frontiers, is now orchestrating
operations from Austria. The Solntsevo gang, the top organisation
among Moscow's 34 criminal fraternities, is involved in prostitution, arms trade and drugs.
There are indications that it is co-operating with organisations
representing former Soviet KGB operational funds 'parked' in Budapest and Prague commercial banks before the collapse of communism. Izvestia also reported that there is evidence the Solntsevo gang has close links with the Columbian cocaine
cartel and is making efforts to corner the lucrative Russian drug
market.
The battle for control has been linked to the recent arrest in the
US of the Russian gangster Vyacheslav Ivanikov, alias 'Yaponchik', the alleged godfather of the Russian drug market.
In the present scramble for supremacy, though, Mikhailov appears
to have the edge. Izvestia has linked the murder of the Moscow television journalist Vlad Listyev last March with the Moscow Mafia power struggle.
According to senior Budapest police officers investigating the
affairs of the Magnex Electronics firm, Budapest and Prague have become the focal point of Russian mafia money laundering operations because of easy access, the weakening of traditional institutional structures and the great protection afforded to the depositors by commercial banks.
Police also claim that Mogilyevich has several "action men" who
worked Mafia operations in Central and Western Europe. One of them was named as Igor Anatolyevich Tkacsenko, who has been linked to a string of serious crimes in the region, but as the witnesses observe the rule of "omerta" he cannot be brought to book.
An alarming increase in a new kind of credit card fraud has also
been linked to Russian criminal entrepreneurs in Hungary. Lieutenant-Colonel Tibor Peer, of Hungary's Serious Fraud Squad, confirmed to SoS that there are "special shops" in Budapest, which have been set up specifically for the purpose of 'milking' stolen but still valid credit cards. Front men 'buy' expensive antiques, furs and consumer durables with the stolen western cards. No goods change
hands, the bank base and the Russian mafia collect the money.
A recent conference in Prague on how to combat organised crime in Central Europe has confirmed the close links between old KGB operatives and the new Russian mafia. According to Vaclav Benda, head of the Czech Police Special Investigations Department, the KGB had deposited more than $ 300m in Prague before the collapse of communism. A slightly higher amount was placed in 'safe accounts' in Budapest early in 1989. This money has since been used in a
variety of criminal activities and then laundered.
Last week, Hungarian Police General Sandor Pinter flew to Moscow to seek help from Anatoly Kulikov, the Russian Interior Minister, on ways of curbing Russian criminal activities in Hungary.
However, Moscow's promise of co-operation will not trouble the
Solntsevo gang and its Central European placemen are unconcerned.
They know that the young democracies of the region provide excellent opportunities for the Russian mafia to operate with impunity. |
