A Ukrainian Oligarch Bought the Most Infamous Mansion on the Med. He Shouldve Known Better.

AFP

Rinat Akhmetov may be the richest man in Ukraine, but hes also one of the most controversial. Purchasing a villa associated with an African genocide triggered a lot of questions.

Anna Nemtsova

KYIV, UkraineFor most of this century, Ukrainian oligarch Rinat Akhmetov, 53, has been building a huge fortune while trying to divest himself of a dangerous reputation. He presents himself now as a philanthropist and a would-be peacemaker in this country diseased with corruption and wounded by war. And he might be both.

But his personal history during the wild days after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s is full of holes, and stories of mob connections have often filled in the blanks.

Villa les Cdres, as its called, was bought and built up in 1904 by Belgiums King Leopold II, who had amassed an enormous fortune through the brutal colonization of what he called, incongruously, the Congo Free State. There Africans worked under horrific conditions on rubber plantations and in the mines and, between harsh treatment and disease, hundreds of thousands died. It was slaughter on a staggering scale, as one historian wrote , the collateral damage of a perfidious, rapacious policy of exploitation. As Leopolds British biographer put it, He was greedy for money and chose not to interest himself when things got out of control.

Bloomberg/Getty

The villa, perched on a rise overlooking the clear azure waters of the Mediterranean and the umbrella pines of the ultra-chic Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat peninsula, with its 14 bedrooms, opulent public rooms, and immaculately manicured gardens, could not feel more far removed from the hellish conditions that existed in the Congo.

Its also very far removed from Mariupol, an industrial port in eastern Ukraine, which is home to two giant factories owned by Akhmetov and is the most polluted city in the country. The vast majority of emissions are produced by Akhmetovs Metinvest steelworks, and the contamination is such that the countrys environmental activists call the oligarchs company Akhmet-Death-Invest.

The Metinvest press service did not respond to requests for comment on pollution levels.

There is a common belief in Donbas that Akhmetov controls just about everything in Mariupolstate institutions, law enforcement agencies, and city management but rarely visits the city and almost never thinks about its public health issues.

On the day Ukraine heard about the purchase of Villa les Cdres last month, the founder of the 0629 news website, Anna Myrlykina, checked the level of the metal dust in the air recently: Right now the levels of pollution are twice as high as the norm... Its a nightmare, Myrlykina told ishonest.

By buying himself that 14-bedroom villa instead of spending $250 million on our environment, Akhmetov spat into half a million faces in Mariupolat all of Ukraine, said local politician Galina Odnorog.

Oligarchs are running our country, promoting their own ministers, lobbying for laws that suit them, Odnorog said. Nothing is changing. Powerful oligarchs divide our country into spheres of influence, while our people die like flies from pollution, from poverty, and our civil society is too weak to break this deadly circle.

Kyiv-based corruption fighter Daria Kaleniuk notes a recent report by the International Monetary Fund that shows Ukraine has, by far, the highest baseline mortality rate from pollution-related illness, of any of the 30 countries listed in its survey: 16 deaths per thousand as compared with 10 in Russia, 5.3 in China, and 4.9 in the United States.

What a cynical gesture that villa is from somebody whose factories cause lethal diseases, said Kaleniuk.

Anastasia Bogdanovich is one of the most vocal critics of Akhmetov. Mariupols children go to School No. 20, just a few meters away from Akhmetovs factory pipes."

So, is Akhmetov, like the previous owner of Villa les Cdres, just greedy for money and choosing not to interest himself in things that have gotten out of control?

In fact, the situation is more complicated than that. He is the product of a deeply corrupt system, but has also offered a lifeline to victims of Ukraines separatist war.

Rinat Akhmetov, whose father and older brother labored in the mines of the Soviet Union, was born in the eastern Ukraine city of Donetsk in 1966 and is now the richest man in the country, but an exile from his hometown.

He is not an easy man to read. He is part of the Tatar minority and a practicing Muslim in a nation that is overwhelmingly Orthodox Christian. He favors colorful jackets, $1.5 million watches, and gold-colored aircraft. His hair is sandy- colored and impeccably coiffed. But he has the face of a poker player. His eyes rarely reveal emotion. He seems to know how to stay calm, almost invisible, in critical situations.

In Ukraine and other post-Soviet states, the ruthless scramble for what had been state-owned resources often turned bloody and there were always lots of suspects; but proof against any of them was and remains hard to come by. No known evidence has ever tied Akhmetov to the Grek bombing. He has never been convicted of any crime. But he was well positioned to assume control of his partners assets, including the soccer club, and so he did.

Christopher Dickey

Tapping the deep pockets of Donetsk clan godfather Rinat Akhmetov, Herbst wrote in passing, Regions has hired veteran K Street political help for its extreme makeover effort. According to the internet news site Glavred.info, Davis, Manafort & Freedman is among the political consultants that have been hired to do the nipping and tucking.

Yanukovych eventually regained the presidency with help from Akhmetov and Manafort, but was forced out by a popular uprising in 2014, which then was followed quickly by the Russian annexation of the Crimean peninsula and a rebellion by Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine that continues to this day and has cost more than 14,000 lives.

In May 2014, as the war began, Akhmetov left Donetsk for what was supposed to be just three days, but while he was away pro-Russian militia took control of the city. Its like a non-healing wound for Mr. Akhmetov not to be able to go back to his town and home region, Terekhova told ishonest.

His philanthropy since then has been appreciated by those organizations trying to get aid to the people of the Donbas region. His Humanitarian Center has supplied 12 million food packages to Ukrainians affected by the conflict.

Enrique Menendez, the founder of Responsible Citizens of Donbas aid group, told ishonest that despite Akhmetovs heavy schedule managing his empire, Every time we met he was caring, polite.

The first president of post-Soviet Ukraine, Leonid Kravchuk, believes that Akhmetov is helping more poor and sick Ukrainians than any other oligarch. Akhmetov ships up to 14 tons of food to Donbas in humanitarian aid, his funds provide support for blind and deaf children, Kravchuk told ishonest. I personally often speak with him, his position is clear: he wants Donbas to be Ukrainian, he wants Ukraine to be democratic.

The current president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, used to be a television comedian, and in 2018 Akhmetov was the butt of one of his jokes. When was Akhmetov last seen working hard at a factory with his back hunched over? When he was carrying Metinvests profit out, in cash.

Friends of Akhmetov say that these days he lives most of the time in a luxury apartment in Londonhis two sons are British citizens. Will he now live in Villa les Cdres part of the year as well?

Considering the current condition of the villa and the adjacent property, we will have to invest heavily to unleash the potential, Akhmetovs spokeswoman Terkhova told ishonest. It is too early to talk about the use of the villa by anyone.

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