Hermitage attacks leniency of Russia in tax fraud ‘cover-up’

Daily Telegraph

Hermitage Capital has accused the Russian state of pressing ahead with a cover up of the biggest tax fraud in Russian history after one of the men behind the scam was given a suspiciously light sentence.

The UK-based investment fund spoke out after a Moscow court confirmed it had found 43-year-old Vyacheslav Khlebnikov, a former convicted felon, guilty of taking part in the £144m fraud.

It gave him the minimum sentence in such cases of just five years in prison which he can appeal. Nor did it require him to return any of the funds or even identify where they were located.

“Khlebnikov’s light sentence is yet another example of how the cover-up of those involved in Russia’s largest ever tax fraud continues,” said a Hermitage representative. “The money stolen by men like Khlebnikov belongs to the Russian people, and passing such lenient and irrelevant sentences merely confirms that the authorities do not really care about justice.”

Hermitage claims that Khlebnikov and his associates stole taxes it had paid to the Russian state in 2006 by using company seals stolen from its offices in trumped up police raids.

It believes that senior officials in the Russian interior ministry and judiciary and gangsters were behind the elaborate plot. Separately, Hermitage is seeking justice for Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who helped it uncover the fraud in the first place.

It says that Mr Magnitsky, who was 37 at the time, was punished for his zeal by being thrown in jail where he was held in squalid conditions for almost a year without trial. He died an agonising death in 2009 after being denied essential medical care. Nobody has been charged. займы без отказа hairy women https://zp-pdl.com/online-payday-loans-in-america.php https://zp-pdl.com/online-payday-loans-cash-advances.php payday loan