The war in Ukraine continues in mud, cold and snow. But it also takes on an unprecedented international, judicial dimension, transforming the planet into a vast chessboard. Hunters are Western investigators. The expelled, Russian individuals and entities, placed on the abundantly fed sanctions lists, in the United States and in the European Union, since the aggression of the Kremlin.
As in terms of military support in kyiv, the United States is at the forefront of this operation. At the beginning of March 2022, a week after the entry of Russian troops into Ukraine, the Minister of Justice Merrick Garland set up a cell – “task force” – called KleptoCapture. This group brings together magistrates and experts specializing in the fight against corruption, tax evasion or money laundering. Relying on human sources, analysis of bank data or information from private companies, the task force embarked on a hunt for Russian property, from boats to planes, villas to cryptocurrencies and works of art. ‘art.
Circuit opacity remains a huge challenge. According to the US Treasury, “several Russian oligarchs” have carried out in particular “significant remittances to their children, especially those studying in the United States, and these transfers have financed significant acquisitions, generally for residential real estate and luxury goods”, through offshore companies.
An unprecedented effort
The targets are the hundreds of names that appear on the lists of the Office of Foreign Assets Controls (OFAC) and the Secretariat of Commerce. These are powerful businessmen who take advantage of state contracts or their proximity to the Kremlin, members of the defense and intelligence sector, or entities involved in circumventing American sanctions, which notably target the military, maritime and aerospace sectors. “After the annexation of Crimea in 2014, we determined specific targets, recalls Daniel Fried, then coordinator of the sanctions policy at the State Department (the American Department of Foreign Affairs). Today, the Biden administration is targeting Russian assets in general. The perception is that the Putin system is a network that needs to be addressed as a whole. The effort has intensified, there are many more government entities involved. »
Andrew Adams, 40, is the director of KleptoCapture. Assistant District Attorney for the Southern District of New York, the magistrate details, for the Worldthe way the task force works. “The possible charges against the people on these lists correspond to everything that can be found: fraud on funds transfers, tax evasion, fraud on visas, drugs… We have made an effort to identify priorities, according to availability of certain assets or the progress of files, when the task force was set up. Some are strategically important players, like Russian politicians or people close to the military and intelligence services. »
You have 68.94% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.