Oligarch Mikhail Friedman and Oleg Deripaska call for an end to Putin’s war
London
CNN Business
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Russian billionaires Mikhail Fridman and Oleg Deripaska have split from the Kremlin and called for an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Friedman, who was born in western Ukraine, wrote in a letter to staff that he wanted to end the “bloodshed.”
“My parents are Ukrainians and live in Lviv, my favorite city. But I have also spent most of my life as a Russian in building and growing businesses. I am deeply attached to the Ukrainian and Russian peoples and see the current conflict as a tragedy for both,” Friedman wrote.
This crisis will cost lives and destroy two nations that have been brothers for hundreds of years. While the solution seems frighteningly elusive, I can only join those whose fervent desire is to end the bloodshed,” he added in the letter provided by his office. The Financial Times was the first to report on the letter.
Friedman is the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Alfa Group, a private conglomerate primarily engaged in Russia And the countries of the former Soviet Union, which include banking, insurance, retail trade, and mineral water production. Friedman’s net worth is $11.4 billion, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
The billionaire is also the chairman of the board of directors of Alfa Bank, the fourth largest financial services company in Russia and its largest private bank. Alpha Bank was hit last week with sanctions that prevent it from raising funds across the US market.
Friedman resigned Tuesday from the board of directors of Veon.
(Fionn) A mobile network provider based in Amsterdam that generates half of its revenue in Russia.
Friedman’s call for peace resonated with Deripaska, a billionaire who made his fortune in the aluminum business.
“Peace is very important! Negotiations must start as soon as possible!” Deripaska said Sunday in a Telegram post.
He also touched on the economic situation in a series of publications on Monday with the collapse of the ruble and the failure of the Russian stock market to open trading.
“I really want clear clarifications and comments on economic policy for the next three months,” Deripaska said, adding that the central bank’s decision to drastically raise interest rates and force companies to sell foreign currency is “the first test of who will actually be paying for this banquet.”
“It is necessary to change economic policy, [we] We need to put an end to all this state capitalism.”
Deripaska emerged from a chaotic scramble for assets in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union with a vast fortune, which Forbes estimated at $28 billion in 2008. And in 2018, he was punished by the United States, which Note that the oligarchy “Inseparable from the Russian state.”
Russia’s oligarchs face economic chaos and punishment from the West afterwards President Vladimir Putin He ordered his forces into Ukraine last week. The United States and its allies, including the United Kingdom, responded by imposing sanctions on the wealthy close to the Kremlin.
The US is even targeting the families of the oligarchs – a new move aimed at eroding support for Putin among the Russian elite. Last week, the US Treasury imposed sanctions on the children of two of Putin’s closest officials.
“Elites close to Putin continue to take advantage of their closeness to the Russian president to plunder the Russian state, enrich themselves, and elevate their family members to some of the highest positions of power,” the Treasury said in its announcement of the sanctions.
Anna Stewart contributed to this article.
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