We hear a lot about Russia’s interference in the 2020 elections. But how does Russia engage in the covert influencing of British politics?
The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network leaks have just given us new evidence as to how. The leaks have illuminated financial flows that were flagged as suspicious.
But as first reported by the BBC, one leak showed how Russian President Vladimir Putin covertly bought influence with the British Conservative Party. It started in 2016 when Suleyman Kerimov, a corrupt, close Kremlin ally of Putin, gave $8 million to another Russian oligarch living in London, Vladimir Chernukhin. The oligarch’s wife, Lubov Chernukhin, then gave just under $2.2 million to the British Conservative Party. In return, she gained access to three successive Conservative prime ministers. The access included tennis matches with then-Prime Minister David Cameron and a $173,000 donation that earned a dinner with then-Prime Minister Theresa May. Following a $58,000 donation in February, Chernukhin played tennis with Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Why is this a problem?
Well, because it shows how Putin has successfully employed Britain-based oligarchs to consolidate London’s tolerance for his malign activities. It is thanks to donors such as the Chernukhins that Britain has tolerated Moscow’s assassination sprees on its soil and the Russian use of London as one big money laundering factory. A parliamentary report examining this concern was finally published in July. Still, the covert influence angle here is quite clear. Kerimov is one of Russia’s wealthiest men and a close Putin ally. It is far from clear why he gave $8 million to the Chernukhins. Except, that is, if one considers that the payment was designed to allow the Chernukhins to lobby for Putin’s interests. Kerimov appears to have been acting as a cutout or an intermediary for Putin. There are a number of British and Russian intermediaries who fill this role in London. But because the Chernukhins have been in Britain for 16 years and are widely perceived as outside of Putin’s orbit, their donations offer a useful degree of plausible deniability against being Kremlin-related.
Regardless, it’s just another example of how the British Conservative Party has chosen Russian money over British foreign policy interests. The Chernukhins might, on paper, be more respectable donors than corrupt Putin cronies in London such as Alisher Usmanov and Roman Abramovich. But their donations should not be seen as anything other than redirected investments from Putin himself. The tennis games are just a nice perk.
