Russian mafia

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Russian Mafia ( Russian Русская мафия, Russkaja Mafia , also Братва, Bratwa, Brotherhood ), also known as the Russian mafia , is the name of various groups of organized crime that originate from the territory of the former Soviet Union and have spread internationally after the collapse of the same . According to the Russian Interior Ministry , the number of Mafia groups rose from 785 in 1990 to over 8,000 in 1996. The estimated number of active Mafia members ranges between 120,000 and 3 million, depending on the source.

definition

For the first time ever, Colonel Militia Aleksandr Ivanovich Gurov confirmed in an interview in July 1988 the existence of the mafia on the territory of the USSR. This was a sensation, because until then the presence of organized crime had been denied by the authorities and, according to the ideological guidelines of the all-ruling CPSU , it should not have occurred at all. In November 1988, the Ministry of Interior of the USSR established the 6th Department for Combating Organized Crime, of which Gurov was appointed head. Gurow characterized the term "Mafia" with the help of three features. First, the mafia is a criminal organization that has a clear structure and hierarchical connections. There is a leader (or a group of leaders), treasury, contact persons, fighters, espionage service, counter-espionage service. Second, the mafia is an organization created to systematically conduct criminal business. Third, a criminal organization only becomes a mafia if there is corruption. This means that the criminal organization must be linked to representatives of the state apparatus who work for the criminals.

Historical development

"Thieves in the law"

The rise of organized crime (OK) in Russia and the successor states of the USSR is closely linked to the Soviet prison and camp culture. At the end of the 1920s, the number of political prisoners in the prisons and camps in the Soviet Union rose sharply due to the rise of mass repression, where the prisoners were more or less left to their own devices. This led to the formation of a hierarchy and group order, headed by professional criminals and enforced with radical and brutal methods if necessary. Because the political prisoners were seen as potential troublemakers, the security services began to work with the professional criminals to ensure order and discipline in the camp. In crooks jargon there was a separate name for professional criminals: Blatnyje (in the plural) or Blatnoj (in the singular). In return, the Blatnyje received privileges. For a long time this was a silent agreement between criminals and camp administrators. Finally, a decree stipulated in writing the permission to use common criminals in the fight against political prisoners stigmatized as " enemies of the people ". The authorities among professional criminals began to refer to themselves as " thieves in the law " ("wory w zakone"). So they created the criminal elite of the Soviet Union and developed a criminal code, the most important principles of which included non-interference in politics and the economy and the refusal to work legally. After the end of the Second World War, Stalin tried to weaken the influence of the criminal elites, but this only led to unrest and uprisings in the camps. This forced the Soviet state to continue working with the criminals. The criminal authorities in the camps grew in power and had good contacts with the outside world. Their main sources of income were smuggling precious metals and works of art, blackmailing underground companies, drug trafficking and theft of products from state-owned companies.

The beginnings of organized crime

The first signs of organized crime in the Soviet Union showed up in 1958-59 under Nikita Sergejewitsch Khrushchev . By today's standards, the average annual loss from economic crimes at that time was only about 2 million rubles. In the 1970s, the mafia became a social phenomenon. Those who used to be embarrassed about their legal millions began to openly invest this money in foreign car brands, diamond necklaces and mansions. More and more money from the state budget went into private hands. There were many methods. The most important of these was the creation of underground workshops (Russian zech ), even underground factories , through which the state's natural resources were relocated. This was accompanied by the so-called Zechowiki - criminals "with white collars" or economic criminals. And as a reaction to the emergence of the shadow economy, a sudden activation of professional criminals of a new kind, the successors of the “thieves in law” from the Stalin era, could be observed. Concepts for “working” with the novel criminals were worked out by a “thief in the law” named Cherkassov. The concepts were: first, take from whoever has something; second, do not take everything, for a person's patience is at an end; Third, get a law enforcement officer for each crime . It was precisely these principles that the criminal organization of Gennady Aleksandrovich Karkov (alias: Mongol) took to heart when it began its criminal activities in Moscow in the early 1970s. According to the unanimous opinion of the Soviet criminologists, the formation of the Soviet mafia began with Karkov's organization. Only in the Uzbek SSR did this process begin a little earlier (1967–68).

Economic vs. Violent criminal

The economic criminals or Zechowiki, who directed the illegal works, were the targets of gangster gangs who tried to force them with various methods to share their profits with them. There was extortion and torture, cars, houses and dachas were set on fire and children were abducted, which is why the term “kidnapping” appeared for the first time in the USSR in the 1970s , a crime that had never happened there before. The money now went into the hands of the gangsters in such amounts that the former professional criminals, the “thieves in the law”, had never owned. No sooner did large sums of money accumulate in the criminal sphere than gang bosses appeared who were able to keep their own guards, combat and espionage personnel. The underground businessmen were the first to ask for peace. A get-together was organized in a North Caucasian city in the mid-1970s, attended by representatives of both types of crime. The Zechowiki agreed to pay 10% of their income to the Blatnyje so that they would leave them alone in the future and even protect them. This means that a vertical was created through which the money from economic crimes flowed up and down: on the one hand, up to the administrative authorities, which protected the Zechowiki from prosecution and signed the illegal deliveries to the underground companies, and, on the other, down to the gangster gangs to protect against attacks. The two ends of the vertical, that is, the administrative authorities and the violent criminals, pretended not to know anything about one another, but they were linked by the millions that were torn from national income with the help of the Zechowiki. Thus, in the 1970s, the various criminal organizations gradually emerged.

The situation in the 1980s

In the 1980s, organized crime in the USSR was at three levels. At the lowest level were the already established criminal groups that operated throughout the European part of Russia, but did not yet have the strength to exert influence on government circles. On the second level there were criminal groups who had already made contact with corrupt officials. The third level contained the amalgamation of several criminal groups, with the strongest criminal clan commanding the others. There was no Union-wide mafia operating in the entire USSR. Each mafia clan controlled its own territory. However, the individual clan leaders knew each other. As far as the Soviet law enforcement authorities knew, there were around 200 mafia groups in the 1980s, one in three associated with corrupt representatives of the state administrative apparatus. The mafia spread mainly in the southern regions of European Russia, in Ukraine, Moldova and especially in Uzbekistan.

Even if the Soviet mafia, unlike western mafia organizations, had no transnational connections, towards the end of the 1980s it was in the process of establishing connections with foreign "partners" primarily with regard to antiques and drugs. These contacts went through the former Soviet crooks who had founded criminal groups in the West, especially in Italy. The cooperative emerging in the late 1980s offered Soviet gangsters the opportunity to legalize their capital.

With the collapse of state power in the course of the 1980s, an increasing corruption of state structures germinated , so that by the end of the decade the milizia was considered the most corrupt part of the state apparatus.

Formation of new mafia groups in the 1990s

The criminal world was also subject to change: the ethnic Russians, who continued to value the traditions of “thieves in the law”, were increasingly confronted with groups from the Caucasus who sought political and economic influence and a minimization of the thief rules. This caused a split in the previously closed criminal community. The collapse of the Soviet state and its structures, the proclamation of new nation states and the poor economic situation at the beginning of the 1990s contributed to the emergence of new criminal groups. After the collapse of the Soviet Union , the KGB workforce was reduced by around 100,000 at Yeltsin's instructions. With their insider knowledge and their contacts, the laid-off employees were highly attractive to the criminal world. Thus, today's organized crime in Russia arose from the structures of thieves in the law, from former KGB agents and many corrupt officials and administrators of state property.

The expansion of OK in Russia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s was one hand in connection with the simultaneous economic decline and another with emerging opportunities of the privatization of collective ownership of state or national wealth. The changing economy , shadow economy and corruption in the process of collapse of the Soviet Union offered the opportunity to accumulate capital in oligarchs by means of new semi-legal to criminal mergers . Desperate unemployed began to work for the crime in large numbers, so the mafia could expand. According to official estimates, around 100,000 people work directly for the Mafia; the number of people indirectly involved in mafiotic machinations is unknown. Many bosses and important members of the Russian mafia were recruited from the officer corps of the Soviet armed forces and the KGB , whose members lost their posts after the end of the Cold War when the armed forces were reduced. The gangs recruited many athletes such as boxers and martial artists to which they in Racketeering , and as a bodyguard could offer financial perspectives. Large parts of the business are conducted through drug and illegal arms trafficking and extortion .

When the notorious mafia boss Vyacheslav Kirillowitsch Ivankov was arrested , his handwritten notes containing the term “family of eleven” (Russian “Семья одиннадцати”) were seized. According to the opinion of the Russian official Yuri Gogolew of the regional office for the fight against organized crime, such mafia giants as Sergei Bojzow (code name: Boyez), Aslan Raschidowitsch Usoyan (code name: ded Chasan, dedushka), Jamal Chatschidze (code name: Jamal), Evgeni Wasin (code name: Batja, Dschem), Alimzhan Tursunowitsch Tochtachunow (code name: Taiwantschik), Zacharij Knjazewitsch Kalaschow (code name: Schakro-molodoj), Datiko Zichelaschwili (code name: Salim Salim: Dato Tashkentskij), Salim. Under the control of the "family" there is a huge territory between the Primorsky Krai and central Russia . Gogolev is also convinced that the criminal leaders in practically every region have direct access to the respective oblast administration.

In 1994 the Russian mafia generated around $ 150 billion. At the time, it controlled a third of Russian banks, 40% of industrial companies and 80% of joint venture companies. In addition, there were 5,700 Russian mafia groups at that time, which numbered more than 100,000 people. About 3 million people made a financial profit from the Mafia machinations. The Russian President Boris Yeltsin said in February 1993 that the OK had become a direct threat to the strategic interests and national security of Russia. In 1994, CIA chief James Woolsey testified before the US Congress that the OK was a threat to democratic reform in Russia. In May 1996, CIA chief John M. Deutch and FBI director Louis Freeh went a step further, warning Congress that the Russian OK and corruption were increasingly infiltrating the Russian political system and were beginning to pose a threat to the United States.

Establishment of the mafia in the legal economy

At the beginning of the 21st century a significant change took place. The Russian mafia was visibly quieter, despite claims that the OK would continue to grow after the global financial crisis of 2008. The role of traditional criminal groups with the “thieves in the law” at their head also gradually lost importance. At the same time, other mafia groups shifted their activities to the legal economy. According to the assessment of the Russian Interior Ministry , the criminal organizations from the CIS have penetrated the most important economic and industrial structures, and even control the industry of entire regions. According to the former Justice Minister Vladimir Ustinov , the OK represents a real threat to the internal security of Russia. In addition to the classic fields of activity such as drug and arms trafficking, criminal structures are increasingly involved in the trade in natural resources as well as in banking and finance. The particularly profitable areas of crime also include smuggling, tax evasion and VAT fraud. The main source of income continues to be state funds, for the embezzlement of which there are numerous possibilities, such as For example, access to Russian energy and metal resources, which are purchased at low domestic prices and are sold on at considerably higher prices abroad, circumventing export regulations. The illegally acquired funds are laundered through letter box companies abroad , subject to legal business activity.

Some large criminal organizations are active across borders and are increasingly pushing into legal economic structures. They often have their own security services and technically sophisticated monitoring methods, so that correct intelligence operations or observations are sometimes carried out to obtain information. Members of the OC are often well educated, politically informed, have close connections to the power structures of their home country and have sophisticated communication networks. For states with a high standard of living, the Russian mafia organizations represent a considerable threat in view of the immense financial resources available, because with the help of blackmail and corruption they not only subvert the economy, but are even able to infiltrate institutions of the rule of law.

Interpol is still observing the post-Soviet OC today (as of 2020) as part of the “Millenium” project. The project aims to support the Interpol member states through the mutual exchange of investigation information to identify people and companies that are behind the transnational Eurasian OK.

Links between the Mafia and Russian intelligence services

The Swiss intelligence service "Service for Analysis and Prevention" (DAP) published a strategic analysis report on the subject of "Organized crime and intelligence from the CIS" in 2007, which shows that there are indications of close ties between the representatives of the OC from the CIS countries to intelligence services of these states. The German intelligence services refer to these entanglements as "symbiotic relationships" between OK and intelligence services.

Many representatives of the OK should be covered by the FSB and other state organs. Until 2007, no leading figure in the Russian mafia scene in Russia was held responsible, which suggests that the leaders of the criminal groups enjoy a high level of protection. Conversely, former KGB or FSB agents, many of whom hold important positions in banks, security companies or other large companies, make their insider knowledge, their experience and their network of contacts available to the OK. In addition, due to the low wages and widespread corruption among intelligence agents, there is a high willingness to sell intelligence material to political or economic interest groups for blackmail. Various foreign intelligence services take the view that not only individual or former members of the secret service are involved in criminal activities, but that intelligence institutions are interested in systematic cooperation with the OC. Motives for cooperation for the intelligence services are the use of already existing international company and relationship networks of the OC for their own purposes, the control of economic activities - especially those of the OC - and high income from services provided for the OC, or income on a basis the blackmail of the OK. Motives on the part of the OC are protection from police actions and criminal prosecution, obtaining information about competitors, simplified travel formalities, refurbishing the image of OC members and advancement into key economic positions through intelligence contacts.

When the Soviet Union collapsed, it was speculated that the KGB had smuggled large sums of state and party assets abroad through private companies in order to finance political activities. Part of this money was also used for private business activities. Behind these processes were often individuals who already had experience in foreign trade and therefore had relationships and corporate structures abroad. This included, among other things, Soviet citizens who were allowed to leave the USSR in the 1970s due to their ethnic or religious affiliation. A prominent example of this are the companies Nordex from Grigori Emmanuilowitsch Lutschanski and Seabeco Group from Boris Iosifowitsch Birschtein. Lutschanski, born in 1945, son of a Latvian-Jewish family, is said to have been recruited by the KGB to set up an international network of companies. He founded the company Nordex with headquarters in Vienna and subsidiaries all over the world, which officially traded in raw materials from the CIS. But since the company was repeatedly associated with corruption, embezzlement, money laundering and arms trafficking, it was no longer possible to expand its business activities. Boris Birschtein (or Birstein, sometimes Birnstein), born in 1947, was also the son of a Latvian-Jewish family and director of a textile factory in Vilnius . He was a former member of the KGB and was in contact with Russian and Israeli intelligence services. In 1979 he emigrated to Israel, where he immediately began to build up the international network of companies Seabeco Group, which traded in oil, gold, diamonds and chemical products. A branch of Seabeco was registered in Switzerland from 1992 to 1999. Birschtein was also very well connected with both the criminal world and the political structures of the successor states of the Soviet Union. His circle of friends and acquaintances included the mayor of Moscow, Yuri Mikhailovich Luschkow , the Ukrainian presidents Leonid Kravchuk and Leonid Kuchma, and the Moldovan president Mircea Ion Snegur . His company Seabeco Group was suspected of money laundering, embezzlement of money from Kyrgyzstan , opaque financial transactions via the company Nordex, embezzlement of aid funds and carrying out contract killings. Neither at Nordex nor Seabeco could the KGB (or its successor organizations) be proven to have been the mastermind behind the illegal financial operations. Possible evidence can be found at those places that are not interested in coming to terms with what happened. However, the widespread political contacts that Lutschanski and Birschtein cultivated at the highest level, and the wealth quickly acquired through trading in state resources, indicate that they could hardly have acted without the knowledge and consent of the state authorities.

Alexander Wassiljewitsch Korschakow , the former KGB officer and bodyguard chief of Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin , had also worked with the Russian underworld. Korschakov, under whose command around 90,000 security service soldiers were, loaned his subordinates to the mafia to collect protection money.

Well-known Mafia groups from the CIS

  • from Moscow and Moscow Oblast 21 Association century Balaschichinskaja, Baumanskaya, Dolgoprudnenskaja, Goljanowskaja, Izmailowskaja, Koptewskaja, Kurganskaja, Lazanskaja, Ljuberezkaja, Medwedkowskaja, Nowokuznezkaja, Orechowskaja, Osetinskaja, Podolskaya, Pushkinskaya, Schtschjolkowskaja, Solnzewskaja
  • from Tolyatti : Agijewskaja, Kupejewskaja, Naparnikowskaja, Schamadowskaja, Schamiljowskaja, Volgowskaja
  • from Kazan : Chadi Taktasch, 29th complex, Kwartala, Tjap-Ljap, Zhilka
  • from Ryazan : Airapetowskaja, Osokinskaja (Archipowskaja), Slonowskaja
  • Ethnic groups: Azerbaijani, Armenian, Georgian, Ukrainian, Uzbek, Kutaiskaya (from Kutaisi ), Lasanskaya, Ossetian, Chechen, Shamadovskaya, Shamiljovskaya

Russian- speaking criminal organizations that do not belong to the thieves in the law refer to themselves as "Zdorowyj Obraz" ("Healthy Lifestyle"). Since the thieves in the law follow various rules of conduct that prohibit, among other things, drug trafficking and pimping, representatives of the "Zdorowyj Obraz" can be found in these areas (who, however, are often confused by laypeople with the thieves in the law).

Of the roughly 150 mafia groups in Moscow at the end of the 1990s, 20 gangs were well-armed, relatively large organizations. Only six of them - three Chechen gangs, the Solntsevo Brotherhood, the Podolskaya Group and the 21st Century Association (founded by Georgians Anzor Aksentjew-Kikalishvili and Otari Kvantrishvili) - exercised real power. The three Chechen groups were closely linked and had a community fund (obschtschjak), which was used to finance lawyers, bribery officials and the support of imprisoned members. Leonid Roitman, a former member of the Magadan Brigade, said something similar, namely that only four mafia groups were significant in the CIS in the 1990s: Solnzewskaja, Izmailowskaja and Podolskaja Bratwa as well as the Chechen group. All other, smaller groups affiliated in some way to these four organizations.

Case study: Ukraine in the 1990s

The catastrophic conditions that prevailed in Ukraine in the 1990s illustrate the extent to which the mafia, politics and business could become interwoven.

Dnepropetrovsk vs. Donetsk

Ukraine gained independence from the Soviet Union on August 24, 1991. Only four years later, there was total lawlessness there. On the whole, there were two political groupings of meaning: the Dnepropetrovsk grouping of Leonid Kuchma to the Pavlo Lazarenko and Yulia Tymoshenko - then she was chairman of the energy company "United Energy Systems of Ukraine" - belonged, and the Donetsk grouping of Wiktor Yanukovych , Rinat Akhmetov and his relatives Achat Bragin (alias: Alik Grek). The two groups came into contact in the energy sector. It was about who will take control of the Ukrainian natural gas and coal companies. In an interview with the Russian-American journalist Seva Kaplan, the criminal authority Leonid Roitman, who had witnessed the conditions at the time, remarked that there was no difference at all between these two political groups and the Russian mafia, since in his opinion both sides were equal were criminals.

Blackmail of the Ukrainian President

During his numerous radio interviews with Kaplan, Roitman described the following situation: When Kuchma became Ukrainian President in July 1994, middlemen from Achat Bragin, a mafia boss from Donetsk Oblast and later chairman of the Shakhtar Donetsk football club , came to him and demanded protection payments in the form of shares in the natural gas sector . That means that the criminal group of Bragin, who considered the whole of Ukraine to be under their rule, would protect the Ukrainian president from the rest of the criminals, shield him from any danger. In Russian crooks jargon, this "service" was called Kryscha (roof). Should Kuchma refuse, Bragin and his people would carry out acts of terror (bombing public transport). Thereupon Kuchma contacted the famous Russian singer and politician Iossif Davydowitsch Kobson and the Mayor of Moscow Yuri Michailowitsch Luzhkov . Both advised Kuchma that he should turn to the "thief in law" Vyacheslav Kirillowitsch Ivankov , who was living in the USA at the time, because he had already helped the Russian government under President Yeltsin to defuse the conflict with the Chechen mafia in 1991/92 .

Negotiations with Ivankov and the Magadan Brigade

In New York Iwankow was together with Oleg Jurjewitsch Asmakow (alias: Alik Magadan) at the head of the Magadan Brigade, whose income came from protection rackets and contract killings. The brigade consisted of about 70 people. Asmakov's "right hand" was Leonid Roitman (alias: Ljonja dlinnyj). Other members were the brothers Juri and Aleksandr Gitman (code name: Kanadskije), Boris Grigorjew, Oleg Ziklop (because he had different eye colors), the brothers Vyacheslav and Aleksandr Konstantinowskij (code name: brothers Karamazowy), the brothers Igor and Juri Tarasenko (code name: Tarasy) and Leonard Abelis. As a representative of the Dnepropetrovsk group, the businessman Mikhail Petrovich Grinschpon went to New York to meet with Ivankov and Asmakov. Grinschpon was accompanied by Aleksandr Levin, who later rose to become an oligarch. Grinschpon, Ivankov and Azmakov managed to convince them to support the Dnepropetrovsk group. As a reward, he promised to hand over his Kiev-Donbass company to the Magadan Brigade . With the help of the Magadan Brigade, Kuchma, Lazarenko and Tymoshenko succeeded in gaining the upper hand over the Donetsk group. How this happened in detail Roitman did not reveal.

When asked why Kuchma and other civil servants had to turn to the Mafia, Roitman replied that the politicians needed people for whom killing was part of everyday business and who could liquidate their political opponents. As early as October 1995, Achat Bragin, the blackmailer of Kuchma, was eliminated on behalf of the political rulers. Kuchma and Lazarenko also instructed the Magadan Brigade to kill the People's Deputy Yevgeny Shcherban in 1996, who at the time had controlled the natural gas industry. Asmakov and Roitman met in the Kiev-Donbass offices with Aleksandr Milchenko (alias: Sailor), famous criminal authority from Dnepropetrovsk. Milchenko had personally received the order from Lazarenko to have Shcherban killed. Miltschenko reported to Roitman that Julija Tymoshenko paid for this contract killing. Tymoshenko's husband also spoke to Milchenko personally and, at Lasarenko's request, commissioned the Shcherban murder. Roitman, who was responsible for security issues, recorded the conversation between Milchenko and Asmakov on audio tapes. As a result, Shcherban, his wife and an aircraft mechanic were shot dead by a killer group on the airfield of Donetsk airport, and two other people were injured. It is not clear in what form the Magadan Brigade was involved. But Milchenko was the one who organized the murder. He was later poisoned because of it.

Kiev-Donbass and the bribe system

The Kiev-Donbass company (now KDD Group ) was founded in 1993 by Mikhail Petrovich Grinschpon. Grinschpon was an advisor to the Ukrainian Defense Minister and was noticed because he used military airfields to smuggle cigarettes and vodka. Grinschpon was also head of the first business center in Kiev, built in 1997 , which was also called Kiev-Donbass . Parallel to the establishment of Kiev-Donbass , Grinschpon founded Nadra Bank in 1993 , of which Viktor Topolov became chairman. The National Bank of Ukraine granted Grinschpon and his Nadra Bank a state loan from funds originally earmarked for equipping the Donbass mines. Grinschpon immediately paid 20% of the loan amount to Kuchma as a bribe. This loan enabled Grinschpon to use his bank to extend loans to business people and companies and to collect bribes of 20% for them. According to Roitman, the system worked like this: when Grinschpon tried to get his 20% from a businessman, the businessman referred him to his boss, the criminal who "protected" the businessman. The first question the criminal put to Grinschpon was whether he had a kryscha , that is, was "protected" by a criminal group, which was not the case at the time. The security authorities refused to help Grinschpon when he asked, because he only gave them a one-time bribe, while the criminals paid it every month. In the 1990s, according to Roitman, Kiev was ruled by seven criminal organizations, the so-called "golden seven", all of which bribed Kiev's security structures.

Mogilevich and the Solntsevo Brotherhood

Kyiv-Donbass still officially belonged to Grinschpon and other shareholders, including Viktor Semjonowitsch Topolow, who later became the Minister for the Coal Industry (2005/06), as well as the businessmen Aleksandr (Aaron) Leonidowitsch Levin (born 1968), Pyotr Slipez and Vasily Anatolyevich Nefedjew, responsible for security issues within the company (ie he was in contact with the militia and the Ministry of Defense). In reality, however, since 1994 the mafiosi Ivankov and Asmakov held 100% of the shares in Kiev-Donbass , which was then an oil and coal mining company. With that, Kiev-Donbass and Nadra came into the hands of the Solnzewo Brotherhood, headed by Semyon Judkowitsch Mogilewitsch , because Ivankow and Asmakow worked for Mogilewitsch. For a long time, Azmakov was supported by Mogilevich. He lived with him in Hungary and received a forged Greek passport from him (as did the entire Magadan Brigade). With Mogilevich and the Solnzewo Bratwa in his back, Grinschpon got the most powerful kryscha one can imagine. As subordinates of Mogilevich, Asmakov and Roitman drove to him once a year to give an account of their activities. They were always accompanied by Aleksandr Levin, who was a kind of in-house accountant of the Magadan Brigade.

Business activity of Kiev-Donbass

The Kuchma government provided Kiev-Donbass with trade contracts. The Magadan Brigade delivered oil and coal via Kiev-Donbass to companies under the direction of Pavlo Lasarenko. According to Roitman, he was the representative of the Magadan Brigade (and thus Solntsevskaya) in the Ukrainian government.

But it was not just about commercial contracts. During the Soviet era, Ukraine had given Hungary a loan of $ 300 million. Kuchma commissioned Kiev-Donbass , and thus the Russian mafia, with the collection of this loan debt , so that everyone involved could enrich themselves personally. So it was about the theft of state funds. For this purpose, a complicated business scheme was developed: Kiev-Donbass received bills from Hungary , for which coal was bought in Russia. The coal was delivered to Kiev-Donbass metallurgical plants in Ukraine in exchange for metal ores, which were eventually sold on the London Stock Exchange worldwide. In this way, the $ 300 million Hungarian loan debt was divided between Kuchma, Lazarenko, Kiev-Donbass and the Hungarian side, which had to be bribed.

In general , according to Roitman, all income from the business of the Kiev-Donbass company was divided between the official and unofficial shareholders. Mikhail Grinschpon, Viktor Topolow, Aleksandr Levin and Vasily Nefedjew received 70%. 30% went to the mafia: Ivankov, Asmakow and Roitman shared 10%, Solnzewo leaders Sergei Anatolyevich Mikhailov , Viktor Averin and Arnold Tamm-Spiwakowski got 10%, and the remaining 10% went to Andrei Vladimirovich Skotsch , Lev Kvetnoi and Alischer Burchanowitsch Usmanow awarded.

Conflicts within the mafia

A dispute later arose between Mogilevich and Asmakov, and they began to split up the joint business. In 1997 the Nadra Bank was sold to Ilya and Wadim Segal, who lived in the USA and maintained close contacts with the Mogilevich group. The brothers had previously bought the Petroff Bank in Moscow , which also belonged to the Solnzewo Brotherhood and Mogilevich. In this way, Nadra Bank has belonged to Mogilevich and his people since then , while Kiev-Donbass remained with Asmakov. Viktor Topolov then left Nadra Bank and became chairman of the Kiev-Donbass company and a shareholder in Kyiv Donbas Development Group NV (KDD Group), which was registered in the Netherlands. At that time, Asmakov owned 45%, Levin 28.32%, Topolov 11.2%, Slipez 11% and Valentin Muzhtschuk (Topolov's shop steward) 3.5% of the shares. Until 1999, Nadra Bank was under the sole control of the Solnzewo Brotherhood, something that was discussed quite openly in Ukrainian banking circles .

Kuchma vs. Lazarenko

There were various reasons for the quarrels between Mogilevich and Asmakov. One of them had to do with the Ukrainian government. Since the Kiev-Donbass Magadan Brigade was turned over, Lasarenko worked with them on behalf of Kuchma. He was their "patron". But then in 1997 a bitter fight began between Kuchma and Lazarenko. As a result, Mogilevich and other leaders of the Solnzewo Brotherhood met in Hungary, at which Asmakov and Roitman were also present. At that time, it was decided to overthrow the Ukrainian President Kuchma and install Prime Minister Lazarenko in his place. In addition, Asmakov met with Lazarenko alone and was commissioned by him to destabilize the situation in Kiev by means of an act of terrorism. There should be bomb attacks on several trolleybuses full of passengers . With great effort, Roitman managed to dissuade his boss from doing this. Therefore Asmakov and Roitman decided not to support Lazarenko, but to support Kuchma, and reported to him about the plans of Lasarenko and the Solntsevo Brotherhood. Kuchma remained President of Ukraine until 2005.

Assassination of Asmakov

With that, however, the chief of the Magadan Brigade had signed his death warrant, because Mogilevich commissioned his murder. On the evening of March 29, 1999, Azmakov was shot two headshots while driving in Kiev by his own people who were accompanying him to a meeting with Kuchma and Ihor Surkis . The shooter was Vyacheslav Konstantinovsky, his brother Aleksandr was at the wheel. The brothers Aleksandr and Vyacheslav Konstantinovsky rose to head Kiev-Donbass after Asmakov was assassinated . According to Roitman, Asmakov's body was frozen in a fishing operation, then sawed up and distributed throughout the city.

By 2014, Kiev-Donbass had invested around $ 1 billion in (mostly) legal projects. At that time, the company concentrated on business development (Kyiv Donbas Development Group or KDD Group) and on gastronomy (restaurant chains “Carte Blanche” and fast food outlets “Puzata Chata”).

The Surkis brothers

Ihor Surkis and his brother Hryhorij Surkis , now Vice-President of UEFA , were very interested in Asmakov's death. In 1992, at the request of the first Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk, they commissioned the murder of Yefim Ostrowski, the then head of Dynamo Kiev . To do this, they turned to Mogilevich, who sent his long-time companion Semyon Jachimowitsch (alias: Byk) to New York to entrust the Magadan Brigade with this matter. The Ostrowski murder was the first contract killing of the budding Magadan Brigade. Subsequently, the Surkis brothers received the Dynamo Kiev football club and rose to become oligarchs. According to Roitman, the violent death of Asmakov was intended to help the Surkis brothers get rid of an unwanted witness in the Ostrowski murder case. After his death, Asmakov's partner Hryhorij Surkis married and gave birth to a son in 2005.

In 1997, at the request of Kuchma, the Surkis brothers, together with Viktor Medvedchuk , also commissioned the murder of the oligarch Vadym Rabinovych , chairman of the Ukrainian Jewish Congress, and the Ukrainian people's deputy Volkov, who were then responsible for many of Kuchma's shadow business. The murder order was received by the Solnzewo Brotherhood, which passed it on to Asmakov and his Magadan Brigade. In this case too, unwanted witnesses should be liquidated on behalf of the Ukrainian President. However, Rabinowytsch survived because he had learned of the planned murder. Failure to carry out the contract killing was also one of the reasons why Asmakov died.

Worldwide expansion of the Russian mafia

According to Colonel Militia Yuri Gogolev, who is responsible for the regional office for the fight against organized crime, which is subordinate to the Russian Interior Ministry , the Russian mafia spread to over 14 countries worldwide in the 1990s. The Russian criminals operate there completely legally, are co-founders of companies and financial institutions.

In Austria

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian mafia began to expand its sphere of influence into Central Europe. By the mid-1990s, several dozen Russian “thieves in the law” and other criminal authorities had settled in Austria. Together with the immigrating criminal subjects, a large amount of “dirty money” entered Austria's economic cycle, which was not only invested in legal companies, but also used for illegal drug and arms deals. The Russian Interior Ministry warned its Austrian colleagues that the Russian bandits in Austria would first take control of the business enterprises run by Russian compatriots and then devote themselves to domestic entrepreneurship.

In the 1990s, there were press reports that Russian entrepreneurs based in Austria sent written invitations to Russia so that their compatriots could apply for an entry visa at the Austrian embassy in Moscow. The embassy received around 550 such applications every month, around 500 of which were from young women. According to the Austrian security authorities, Vienna was the center of Russian trafficking in women in 1995 , as there was a clear increase in Russian and Ukrainian waitresses and dancers in Vienna's nightclubs as well as Russian prostitutes across Austria.

Also in the 1990s, Austrian experts feared that the Russian mafia would expand its influence on the Austrian real estate market. For example, in 1995 a single Russian company owned 84 properties in Vienna alone. Jack Blum, the American expert on international financial crime, even saw Vienna in 1998 as a center for money laundering from the former eastern states. The share of crimes committed by the Russian Mafia in relation to the total crime rate in Austria was estimated at 30–35% by the Austrian security authorities.

Mafia crimes in Austria

On May 14, 1998, the Russian mafia became the subject of the 121st session of the National Council of the Republic of Austria . The FPÖ and the member of parliament Ewald Stadler made an urgent motion "regarding links between politics and the Russian mafia". It found that since the collapse of the Eastern bloc in Austria there has been an increasing number of people from the former USSR who have been infiltrated by organized crime groups. This has been proven by structural analyzes by the EDOK . There was no doubt that the Russian mafia was involved in the following criminal cases:

  • September 1994: Murder of the Russian businessman Sergei Tschingizowitsch Hodscha-Akhmedov (or Chodzha-Akhmedov) in Vienna. On September 19, 1994, the Russian mafia carried out its first death sentence within Austria on 37-year-old Hodscha-Achmedov, who was killed with 19 shots from a submachine gun in front of his apartment in Vienna- Döbling , which put the Austrian security authorities on high alert. Achmedow came to Austria in 1989 and initially lived in the Traiskirchen reception center . A short time later, he suddenly had a lot of money, was constantly surrounded by attractive Russian women, founded a company that dealt in auto parts and rented an office in one of the most expensive districts of Vienna. According to the information provided by the investigator at the time, Hans Schaffer, Achmedow offered prostitutes from the Eastern Bloc to the Viennese red-light district , but did not keep to the agreements made. For Die Welt , which reported on it in January 1995, there was no doubt that Akhmedov earned his living with prostitution, drug trafficking and probably also arms smuggling. The hit man who had collected 10,000 shillings for the murder was later caught. The Mafia also tried to kill the investigating officer Schaffer when he drove to the criminal trial in his company car in 1996 and a stranger threw a hand grenade under his car.
  • July 1996: murder of Georgian businessman David Sanikidze in Vienna, governor of the Georgian mafia in Moscow and friend of Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze . Sanikidze had business relationships with various Russian and Uzbek mafia groups and attracted attention in Austria for buying weapons. He was also the managing director of a Viennese company that benefited from political and economic activities in the former USSR. He was also the managing director of ABV Leasing and Hotelinvest , which invested in hotels in Russia and Georgia.
  • July 1996: Murder of the Jewish money changer Izrael Laster in Vienna- Floridsdorf .
  • December 1997: Arrest of Anatoly Radtschenko (nickname: Tschelentano or Celentano), a contract killer of the Russian mafia, in Schwechat , who was responsible for the murder of a Russian national in Paris.
  • May 9, 1998: murder of Siegfried Goluch, managing director of the Haban jewelry store, in Vienna, allegedly by Vladimir Aleksandrovich Gurtschenkow, a member of the Solnzewo brotherhood.

Contacts of Austrian politicians with the Mafia

In the FPÖ application of May 14, 1998 it was explicitly pointed out that - knowingly or unknowingly - there had been a large number of contacts between Austrian politicians and people from the milieu of the Russian mafia, which not only endangered Austria's reputation, but also the access to new markets in Austria was made easier for the Russian mafia.

The then Federal Chancellor Franz Vranitzky intervened for the Austrian building contractor Leopold Bausbek because of planned hotel projects with the later murdered David Sanikidse. Bausbek founded the ABV Group in 1978 , which included International Project Engineering Consult , ABV Leasing- und Hotelinvest , ABV Allgemeine Bauten-Vertriebsgesellschaft and Marco Polo Hotels & Resorts . Bausbek built eight luxury hotels in the former Soviet Union in the 1980s and was married to a relative of Shevardnadze. During the opening of the 5-star hotel "Rachat Palace" in Almaty in 1995, according to the Kronen Zeitung, contact was made with the Latvian-Jewish entrepreneur Grigori Emmanuilowitsch Lutschanski , through whose Viennese company Nordex transferred the entire assets of the Soviet Communist Party to the West should have been. An official of the German intelligence service described Lutschanski as the "boss of all bosses of the Eastern Mafia in Europe", who "like many other godparents, has been allowed to go about his business in Vienna for years without being disturbed". According to the responsible police officers, the investigation of the Sanikidze case was hindered by the EDOK, especially when it came to disclosing the political implications in Austria. In addition, Vranitzky had "close contacts" with the former mayor of St. Petersburg Anatoly Alexandrowitsch Sobtschak , who was promised the financing of an Austria Square, which, according to the FPÖ, "seeped into dark channels".

Like his former party leader Vranitzky, the SPÖ MP Peter Marizzi “ flew around in the mafia 's private jets in the former Soviet Union” to do business with the mafia patrons of the Central Asian republics, said Ewald Stadler during his speech to the Austrian National Council. The eastern contacts of the former interior minister Karl Blecha were also known , who had been involved in a company since 1992 together with the former foreign minister Leopold Gratz and Sanikidze, who are said to have been primarily responsible for extorting protection money from western investors. Stadler also accused Blecha of maintaining "very close contacts" with the Eastern Mafia, including the leader of the Solnzewo brotherhood, Sergei Michailow. The former Agriculture Minister Erich Schmidt also had extensive contacts with the East. In the course of his bankruptcy, it became apparent that millions of dollars were disappearing through his convoluted corporate empire in the east.

In Germany

During the Cold War , over half a million Soviet soldiers were stationed in the GDR . The Russian criminal groups took this opportunity and built a very strong and stable base among the Russian troops. In the 1990s, millions of former Soviet citizens emigrated to Germany, including ethnic Germans , Jews, Russians, Caucasians, and Ukrainians. But there were also high-ranking criminals among the immigrants. In 1997 there were over 15 Russian-speaking “thieves in the law” in Germany. B. Alimzhan Tursunowitsch Tochtachunow (code name: Taiwantschik), Heidar Megdetowitsch Jusipov (code name: Leksik) and Anatoli Iljitsch Roksman (code name: Tolja Zhdanowski). In addition, the mafia bosses Vyacheslav Kirillowitsch Iwankow (code name: Japontschik) and Sergei Anatoljewitsch Michailow ( code name: Michas) came to Germany. In the 1990s, of the 50 Russian organized crime groups operating in Germany, around 20 came from the city and Moscow Oblast. One third of all crimes committed in Germany during this period were committed by Russian-speaking criminals.

According to the Federal Criminal Police Office, the activities of the Russian-speaking mafia organizations in Germany mainly included extortion, car theft, pimping, smuggling of art objects, antiques, drugs, precious metals and petroleum products. Berlin became the center of the Russian mafia in Germany, and according to some sources even in Western Europe. In 2007, ten criminal groups with 95 members who were descendants of former Soviet republics were uncovered by German authorities. In 2008 there were already fourteen such groups with 167 active members, mainly Lithuanians, Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians and Azerbaijanis. Moldovans and Kyrgyz people were also among those involved in illegal activities without being a mafia member. In 2006 and 2007, the focus of criminal activities in Berlin was on car theft, account opening fraud , transfer fraud and other economic crimes. Counterfeiting of documents and money as well as drug trafficking ( marijuana , ecstasy ) were also important .

The second German city preferred by the Russian Mafia is Cologne . The so-called Kölnskaja Group, arguably the most influential Russian-speaking mafia group in Germany, operates there. It has around 100 members and is active in 500 other European cities in addition to Cologne. The main activities of this criminal organization include extortion, smuggling and trafficking in drugs and weapons. Another group operating in Germany is called the Dolgoprudnenskaja Group. There are also smaller, independent, ethnic groups (Chechens, Georgians, Armenians, Azerbaijanis) who pursue their criminal activities in Frankfurt am Main , Düsseldorf and Hamburg . In Düsseldorf, the Russian-speaking mafia organizations are supposed to control the nightlife and prostitution. According to the BKA, at least 10,000 Russian women nationwide were forced into prostitution.

Money laundering poses a considerable problem for the German authorities. There have been several attempts to legalize the money, mostly illegally acquired in the Russian Federation. During an operation carried out by the Stuttgart law enforcement authorities in 2007, three former Russian citizens were arrested for laundering around EUR 8 million in real estate transactions. The money was deposited in several accounts of the Berliner Bank and a branch of the Commerzbank in Esslingen . Mafia members bought and sold buildings and land in and around Stuttgart through these accounts . In addition, they founded the company S&L Iba GmbH with headquarters in Wendlingen and Stuttgart to manage the funds . Later it turned out that the laundered money came from various illegal deals carried out by the Izmailovskaya group.

In a report by the Federal Criminal Police Office in July 2016, its boss Holger Münch spoke of a dynamic development in Russian-Eurasian organized crime that is spreading to West Germany. Of the most dangerous groups, the conspiratorial brotherhood “Thieves in the Law” would stand out most clearly. The BKA used to associate 20,000 to 40,000 people with this organization. The authority currently speaks of a "five-digit number". In German correctional facilities, where 8 to 10% of all prisoners are Russian-speaking or of Russian descent, there is enormous “recruiting potential”. The criminal gangs would, among other things, focus on home burglary, theft, prostitution, extortion and fraud.

In Germany, only one active group of the Russian mafia is known to date: the Samarowskaja Gruppa , which directs activities in East Germany from Berlin and those in the West from Cologne. However, several comparable, previously undiscovered organizations can be assumed in German territory alone.

In Switzerland

Switzerland has seen an increase in money flows from the former USSR since the early 1990s. Swiss authorities found that between $ 40 billion and $ 50 billion had been deposited in Swiss banks and other financial institutions by citizens of the former Soviet republics. Switzerland welcomed this financial influx as its banking sector was increasingly exposed to competition from offshore and mainstream global banks. There was no way of knowing to what extent this money came from criminal activity. In the course of time, the former Soviet citizens bought real estate in Switzerland, relocated to Switzerland with their families and began to actively participate in the regional economy. The Swiss Federal Prosecutor Carla del Ponte stated that by 1999 the Russian-speaking organized crime groups had infiltrated around 300 Swiss companies in order to use the country as a “piggy bank”. In the 2000s, there was a change in the Russian mafia groups in Switzerland. Since then, in addition to those criminal groups who conduct their illegal business in other countries and only use Switzerland for money laundering, there have now also been new criminal groups whose members have moved to Switzerland. These new groups are typically small and involved in crimes such as theft and robbery. In the canton of Vaud, for example, 11% of crimes committed in 2008 were robbery, of which 24% were home burglaries, mostly carried out by people from the former Soviet Union (primarily Georgians).

In Belgium

The activities of the Russian mafia in Belgium focus on prostitution, pornography and economic crimes. Many Russian-speaking gangs operate in Brussels , but their main criminal activity is Antwerp and its port as the main base for transatlantic smuggling operations.

In the Netherlands

Amsterdam was seen as the stronghold of Russian mafia groups in the 1990s. Due to the liberal Dutch drug policy , the mafia gangs were able to use the Netherlands as a transit point for the illegal drug trade. Other areas of criminal activity were prostitution, pornography and smuggling of stolen vehicles. As in other Western European countries, the larger Russian-speaking gangs focused on economic crime. For this reason, money laundering and counterfeiting offenses are particularly common. The Netherlands, like Belgium, also acts as a base for transatlantic criminal operations.

In Spain

The first Russian-speaking criminal organization emerged in Spain in the early 1990s and consisted mainly of Ukrainians, Belarusians, Georgians, and Chechens. Since 1994 these groups, which were now interspersed with the newly wealthy Russians who had just flourished and opaque Russian market economy, established themselves primarily in three regions: on the Costa del Sol in the province of Málaga (here especially in the tourist cities of Marbella and Estepona ), in the catchment area of Valencia ( Torrevieja and Benidorm ) and on the Catalan coast.

In 1993 the Spanish consulate in Moscow issued 44,584 visas, and in 1994 this number almost doubled. In the next two years, the Spanish government oriented itself towards a stricter set of rules when issuing visas to citizens of the former Soviet republics. However, this did not prevent the criminal groups from taking control of the issuing of visas in their respective countries of origin. The visa system was later simplified so that Russian-speaking criminals found easier access to Spain.

All signs point to the existence of large scale money laundering operations in Spain carried out by Russian-speaking organized crime groups. The investments are made by individuals or by commercial companies based in Spain whose capital comes from the CIS countries and which have primarily specialized in foreign trade, property sales, gastronomy and tourism, i.e. industries with high cash flows. In March 2003, an important meeting of “thieves in the law” took place in Spain. Participants were: Zacharij Knjazewitsch Kalaschow (Schakro molodoj), Aslan Raschidowitsch Usojan (ded Chasan), Vladimir Anatoljewitsch Tjurin (Tjurik), Vitali Izgilow (Zwer, Vitalik Makhachkalinsky), Tariel Oniani (Taro), Merschamalija Chatschidze (Jamal; he represented the Solnzewo Brotherhood), Wachtang Kardawa or Vahtang Kardava (Wacho), Mamuka Mikeladze (Mamuka), Armen Arutjunow and Leonid Kaplan (Leon Lann). At this meeting it was decided to set up a corporate network in Spain for money laundering purposes. The criminally acquired capital should then be invested in the real estate on the Costa del Sol . For this purpose, the companies Suninvest 2000 , Elviria Invest , Megrisa, Megabetta V & N and Inmobiliarios Estepona were founded. Later, during their investigation, the Spanish authorities found that two founders of Suninvest 2000, Leon Lann and Konstantin Manukjan, were the main people responsible for money laundering in Spain.

Groups specializing in theft of luxury cars have also emerged on the Costa del Sol and in Madrid. The stolen stolen property was then transported to Eastern Europe by Russian or Polish criminal groups and sold there. The spread of prostitution rings, which are controlled by the Russian Mafia and have established themselves in the member states of the European Union and Turkey, has not caught on in Spain.

Police operations in Spain

"Operation Avispa"

In 2005 the Spanish authorities started a large-scale police operation under the code name "Operation Avispa". During the first phase in June 2005 (“Avispa I”), 28 suspects were arrested, 22 of whom were alleged Russian mafia bosses. Among those arrested was the Georgian mafia boss Tariel Oniani , who had worked in the construction industry in Spain since the late 1990s . Oniani was able to evade Spanish jurisdiction. But his supporters have been accused of having founded a criminal syndicate that legalizes funds from the criminal underworld of Russia through real estate investments in the tourist resorts of Marbella , Fuengirola , Benalmádena and Torremolinos . 400 police officers participated in this operation. 41 properties were searched and 800 bank accounts were frozen. In the second phase in November 2006 ("Avispa II") 9 other people were arrested. On November 3, 2010, Vladimir Tyurin was arrested by the Russian intelligence service FSB. The Spanish authorities, who applied for an international search for Tyurin, believe that he was the organizer of the entire money laundering system.

"Operation Troika"

In the summer of 2008, another anti-mafia operation by the Spanish authorities took place in the form of “Operation Troika”, during which 20 people were arrested, including the alleged leaders of the Tambovskaya Malyshevskaya group, Aleksandr Malyshev, Mikhail Rabo and Genady Petrov. This mafia organization is suspected of having "laundered" tens of millions of euros a year with the help of 500 bank accounts. This money was made in St. Petersburg, where the gang is a drug trafficker and has hotels, restaurants and a high level of influence in the banking sector.

"Operation Java"

In March 2010, " Operation Java " was carried out, in which 69 people were arrested, including 24 in Spain (15 in Barcelona, ​​4 in Getso, 4 in Valencia, 1 in Guadalajara). Further searches and arrests as part of “Java” took place in Germany, Switzerland, Austria, France and Italy. The alleged leader of a mafia group, the Georgian Kahaber Shushanashvili, was arrested in Barcelona. Most of the gang members were Georgians. Their main activities were money laundering, contract killings, extortion and theft. Investigations found that this criminal organization was involved in criminal offenses in at least ten European countries as well as in Colombia and Mexico . The police believe that one of the greatest successes of this operation was the securing of the "holy of holies", a register with all monetary income in the collective coffers of the mafia group. This is the main piece of evidence against the captured members of the mafia network.

In France

As in most European countries, the Russian-speaking organized crime groups in France have been involved in crimes since the early 1990s, ranging from ordinary theft to complex money laundering operations. What was characteristic of France, however, was the fact that these groups were involved in crimes related to precious metals, precious stones, petroleum and the timber industry. They were also involved in the antique trade and high-class prostitution. For a long time, the Russian-speaking mafia groups in France were associated with the name Alimzhan Tursunowitsch Tochtachunow (alias: Taiwantschik), who officially ran model agencies , but was unofficially regarded as the patron (Russian smotryashchy ) of the Russian mafia in Europe. He became well known when he was charged with influencing performance results at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City . He influenced both French judges, who rated the Russian team higher, and Russian judges, who voted in favor of the French team. In the end, his involvement in the matter could not be proven and the case was closed. The interest of the Russian mafia in France is also demonstrated by the frequent visits of criminal leaders from the former Soviet Union, some of whom settled in France for a certain period of time, including the “thieves in the law” Beslan Alekseevich Dschonua (code name: Besik), Jamal Chatschidze (Alias: Jamal), Sergei Viktorovich Jermilow (alias: Ded) and the leader of the Mazutkinskaya group Aleksei Dinarowitsch Petrov (alias: Petrik, Ljonja chitryj). The criminal case in which the “thief in the law” Amiran Gazdeliani (alias: Bego) was involved was well known. He was arrested and convicted in 2005 together with two other Georgian “thieves in the law” Paata Zaurijewitsch Bazradze and Dscheiran Kinzurashvili for stealing cars in Antwerp and the subsequent smuggling of vehicles to Eastern Europe and the CIS countries. Gazdeliani is a compatriot and confidante of Tariel Oniani , who helped him to settle in France. The Russian mafia is mainly active in the south of France, especially on the Côte d'Azur , because this region is well developed economically and very popular with tourists. Many criminal authorities also settle there permanently. Experts believe that many of the mafia members are heavily armed ex-military officers from former regions of the Soviet Union such as Chechnya. Of the 69 arrests made during "Operation Java", the majority were in France.

In Sweden

The first Russian-speaking mafia groups also appeared in Sweden after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The increased interest of criminal groups in Sweden was probably related to the relatively short distance between the Swedish east coast and St. Petersburg, one of the centers of the Russian mafia. Its main activities included smuggling and trading in art objects and antiques from the former Soviet republics, as well as the theft of various goods that were subsequently smuggled into Russia. Initially, these crimes were carried out by small, unrelated groups. However, the Tambov gang was later blamed for various crimes that were committed in Sweden . In recent years, an increased number of crimes has been observed by Georgians and Azerbaijanis. Most of these ethnic criminal groups are quite small - three to five members - and commit "simple" crimes such as theft, robbery and extortion. Its members are in most cases immigrants who came to Sweden from the start with the aim of committing criminal offenses. Most of the time, they manage to obtain a legal residence permit and provide all the necessary documents to fully benefit from the Swedish welfare system . In addition to the gangs that commit “simple” crimes, there are also groups that are more organized and carry out complex criminal activities. In the summer of 2010, thanks to investigations by the Swedish police, an elaborate fraud system was uncovered, which involved people living in Sweden who were carrying fake Bulgarian, Czech and Greek ID cards, but who were actually from the CIS countries. In addition, a considerable number of companies have been founded in Sweden by citizens of the CIS, which operate on immense amounts of money but have almost no economic activity. At least two “thieves in the law” - including Dmitri Rawiljewitsch Galejew (alias: Galei) - from the group led by Georgian Tariel Oniani lived in Sweden.

The Russian mafia used Sweden, at least in the 1990s, as the main transit point for smuggling illegal immigrants westwards. For this reason, an entire industry has been set up underground to produce and distribute false or stolen passports, visas and other travel documents.

In Poland

The Russian mafia in Poland, which includes ethnic Russians as well as Ukrainians and Belarusians, is the most dangerous and influential among the country's criminal organizations. She is involved in criminal activities related to murder, pimping, car theft, and car smuggling into the CIS countries. In 2011, more than 20,000 Russian-speaking criminals operated within Poland. As a result, the country housed the numerically largest diaspora of Russian criminals in the world. Poland was the first country outside the USSR to be infiltrated by Russian-speaking organized crime groups. Before 1992, these groups managed to achieve criminal hegemony in Poland by almost completely displacing Romanian and Albanian mafia groups, while local Polish gangs only retained partial control over car pushing and drug trafficking. In 2008, Kosovar Albanians attempted to regain influence in Poland's crime scene by establishing a dealer network in Poznan , a city considered the Polish capital of Russian crime. The result was several cases of murdered Albanians, including relatives of the President of the Republic of Kosovo Hashim Thaçi . For a long time, many Russian-speaking mafia groups specialized in road robbery, as Poland has a well-developed transit road system. To this end, the criminals used various methods to extort a fee from motorists to drive through Polish territory: assaults on people who were stopping at border crossings, parking lots or petrol stations; Stopping vehicles by blocking the road, placing objects that puncture tires, or feigning a police stop. The most effective tool, most commonly used by these groups, was what is known as criminal terrorism, in which the victim was mentally weakened.

In Hungary

In 1991, shortly before they were returned to the Soviet Union, over 1,000 members of the Soviet Army stationed in Hungary deserted . Many turned to crime. Since then, there has been an increase in criminal activity by the Russian mafia in the Hungarian capital Budapest , with the gangs taking advantage of previous contacts with the Soviet military. The crimes committed included theft and smuggling of cars, prostitution and racketeering. Larger gangs in Budapest specialized in economic crimes and money laundering through the acquisition of Hungarian companies during the privatization process.

In Italy

At least six Russian mafia gangs operated in Italy in the 1990s. The crimes committed included robbery, arms and drug smuggling, white-collar crime and extortion. Some crimes were committed in collaboration with the Italian mafia. The Russian mafia groups were most strongly represented in Milan , where they primarily focused on economic crimes.

In Greece

Greece is one of the EU countries where the Russian mafia has settled. The criminal groups operate there in a relatively inconspicuous manner so as not to attract the attention of the Greek law enforcement authorities. At the same time, the criminals from the former Soviet Union managed to forge strong and lasting relationships with local criminal groups, so that there have been no serious clashes between them to this day.

There is one important factor that plays a role in relation to the emergence and development of Russian-speaking criminal groups on Greek soil. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a large number of Pontic Greeks , including criminals, returned to Greece from the former Soviet republics - Georgian SSR and Ukrainian SSR . After a short time, the Russian-speaking Pontic Greeks took control of the leather and fur industry in some regions. They were also involved in drug and human trafficking. One of these criminal groups was called Zalkskaja, so named after the Georgian city of Zalka , the only city in the Soviet Union in which only Greeks lived. Another Mafia group called itself Sochumskaja (after the Georgian town of Sukhumi ), which is considered by some experts as the most powerful and influential criminal organization in Northern Greece. Sochumskaja members are involved in human trafficking by supplying Greek brothels and night clubs with women from the CIS countries. Greek law enforcement agencies also found that Russian-speaking criminal groups are involved in various types of tax and banking fraud. A notable case was uncovered in 2005. Several people from the CIS countries made bank transfers, only to be able to cancel them a few hours later and claim the money back for various reasons. The banks reimbursed the amounts, but were not able to get back the "incorrectly" transferred funds because they had already been transferred to Russian bank accounts. The rationale behind this fraud scheme was that the account holders were employed by front companies that charged a fee for transfers.

On December 11, 2010, a significant gathering of 50–60 Mafia bosses and “thieves in law” from the former Soviet Union took place in Greece. It is believed that this meeting served to resolve a conflict between the groupings of Aslan Usojan and Tariel Oniani. This conflict had lasted for several years and had some deadly consequences: the murder of Vyacheslav Kirillowitsch Ivankov in Russia in October 2009, of Vladimir Janashia in France in March 2010 and Malchaz Kitija in Greece in May 2010, and the attempted murder of Aslan Usoyan in Moscow in September 2010.

In Cyprus

Cyprus and its tax law are abused by the Russian mafia for money laundering. It is estimated that by 1996 about $ 1.3 billion had reached Cyprus from Russia every month. Around 2,000 Russian companies were founded there in the 1990s for this purpose. In 1995 the port city of Limassol was rocked by a series of bomb attacks, some of which were related to the rivalry between Russian gangs.

In the USA

Russian organized crime spread primarily in those American cities and states that had high numbers of Russian emigrants, such as New York City and Philadelphia, and parts of Florida and California . During the 1970 / 80s, nearly 200,000 Soviet citizens, mostly of Jewish origin, immigrated to the USA. In this context, Dan Lungren , a former California attorney, told the US Congressional Foreign Relations Committee that under the pretext of liberalized Jewish immigration policies, "the KGB was ridding its prisons of die-hard criminals" and that many of these criminals were criminals continued in the United States. The tide of Soviet emigrants continued to rise when two laws were passed: the 1989 Lautenberg Amendment (so named after Frank Lautenberg ), which made it easier for Soviet Jews to immigrate to the United States, and in May 1991 the first Soviet law that granted the citizens of the USSR the right to emigrate and travel freely.

In the late 1990s, 28 US states saw numerous Russian mafia activities including extortion, prostitution, car theft, counterfeiting, credit card fraud , illegal drug trafficking, insurance fraud, money laundering, murder, and other crimes. Among the Russian-speaking criminal groups, the so-called Odessa Mafia was regarded as the largest organization operating on American soil. The Odessa Mafia was founded in Brighton Beach between 1971 and 1982 and then spread to San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Organized crime groups known in the USA from former territories of the USSR (as of 1996):

  • Solnzewo Brotherhood . Leaders: Sergei Anatoljewitsch Michailow (born 1958), code name: Michas, and Viktor Sergejewitsch Aveverin (born 1957), code name: Avera.
  • Organization Ludwig Fainberg. Leader: Leonid Fainberg (born 1958), also known as Ludwig Fainberg, Lyoscha-Tarzan, Lev Panamskij, Alon Bar or Leon Bar. Ukrainians of Jewish descent.
  • Organization Monja Elson. Leader: Monja Abramowitsch Elson (born 1951 in Chisinau ), alias: Kishinevsky. Moldovans of Jewish descent.
  • Chechen organization. Leader: Ruslan Chamidowitsch Labazanow (born 1967), alias: Lobzik. Chechens.
  • Ljuberzkaya organization. Leader: Wadim Voronin, alias: Wadik or Worona.
  • Dagestani organization. Leader: unknown.
  • Mazutkinskaya Organization. Leader: Aleksei Dinarowitsch Petrow (born 1962), real name Aleksei Igorewitsch Grischman, also known as Aleksei Suvorov, Lyona Petrik, Lyona Chitryj. Russian of Jewish descent.
  • Organization Baklanov. Leaders: Boris Lungin and Lev Andelman.
  • Organization of Ivankov. Leader: Vyacheslav Kirillowitsch Iwankow (1940–2009), alias: Japontschik.
  • Organization Mogilevich. Leader: Semjon Judkowitsch Mogilewitsch (born 1946). Ukrainians.
  • Organization Kikalishvili. Leaders: Anzor Kikalishvili and Iossif Davydowitsch Kobson .
  • Organization Fanchini. Leader: Riccardo Fanchini.
  • Kazanskaya organization. Leader: unknown.
  • Organization Brandwain. Leader: Rachmiel Brandwain. Ukrainians of Jewish descent.
  • Organization Boris Sorkin. Leader: Boris Sorkin.
  • Organization Mikhail Rudjak. Leader: Mikhail Rudjak.
  • Organization Bruk. Leader: Michail Bruk.
  • Organization of Ibragimov. Leader: Nikolai Ibragimov.
  • Organization of Itayev. Leader: Meir Itajew.
  • Organization Sergei Efros. Leader: Sergei Moiseyevich Efros.
  • Organization Sogomonjan. Leader: Georgi Sogomonjan.
  • Organization Sogomonian. Leader: Levon Sogomonian.
  • Organization Arakelian. Leader: Vrej Arakelian.
  • Organization Blikian. Leader: Nischan Blikian.
  • Vilnius Brigade. Leader: Georgi Dekanidze (born 1937), alias: Gruzin, Shora. Georgians.
  • Organization of Vorkuta. Leader: Viktor Panchuk.

In addition to the aforementioned Russian-speaking groups in the USA, there was also the Magadan Brigade, led by Oleg Yuryevich Asmakov (alias: Alik Magadan), which was active in Brighton Beach in the 1990s . Asmakov was killed in Kiev in March 1999. In addition to Asmakov, the members of the Magadan Brigade were Leonid Roitman (Ljonja dlinnyj), who advanced to Asmakov's “right hand”, the brothers Juri and Aleksandr Gitman (alias: Kanadskije), Boris Grigoryev, Oleg Ziklop (because he had different eye colors ), the brothers Vyacheslav and Aleksandr Konstantinowskij (code name: Brothers Karamazow), the brothers Igor and Juri Tarasenko (code name: Tarasy) and Leonard Abelis. The Magadan Brigade carried out numerous contract killings in New York, Kiev and Moscow. In 1992, the Magadan Brigade in Queens shot and killed businessman Yefim (Jeff) Ostrovsky for $ 100,000. Asmakov killed the Soviet boxer Oleg Georgievich Karatajew, who was himself a bandit and blackmailer, in Brighton Beach in 1994. A failed assassination attempt was made against the criminal authority Monja Elson in New York.

Contacts to other mafia organizations

There were also brutal clashes with international groups, including the Italian mafia and the Japanese yakuza . It is believed that contacts with Colombian drug traffickers in the cocaine business were made as a result of a certain decline in drug transport in the Soviet Union. The gangs' core businesses included smuggling illegal workers into the EU and trafficking in prostitution . Money laundering activities reached as far as Spain , Portugal and the USA , where Mafia king Vyacheslav Ivankov (1940–2009) entered the country in 1992 and was arrested in 1995 after setting up one of the most powerful criminal networks. In 2004 he was transferred to Russia on charges of murder, but was released there immediately. Other well-known mafia bosses from the former Soviet Union include Aslan Usoyan and Tariel Oniani .

According to the FAZ, the Italian chief prosecutor Pierluigi Vigna announced during a press conference in 1995 that the Italian and Russian mafia were working ever closer together in the arms and drug trade as well as in foreign exchange deals. The basis for this was laid in 1992 when the bosses from the two Mafia organizations met in Prague in 1992.

literature

  • J. Alexandrow: Otscherki kriminalnoi subkulturi . Moscow 2001
  • Dimitrij Gede: With violence to power and the power of violence: How could organized crime in Russia develop into a state within a state? Grin Verlag, November 2011, ISBN 978-3-656-05121-3
  • Mikhail Gorbachev: The collapse of the Soviet Union . Bertelsmann Verlag, Munich 1992, ISBN 978-3-570-02068-5
  • Andrei Illesch: The red godparents. Organized Crime in the Soviet Union . Reinbek 1995, ISBN 978-3-499-19333-0
  • Jürgen Roth : The oligarch. Vadim Rabinovich breaks the silence . Europa Verlag, Hamburg 2001, ISBN 978-3-203-81527-5
  • Jürgen Roth: The gangsters from the east. Blacked edition. New ways of crime . Europa Verlag, 2004, ISBN 978-3-203-81526-8
  • Jürgen Roth: The red bosses . Pieper Verlag, 1998, ISBN 978-3-492-03867-6
  • Jürgen Roth: The Russian Mafia. The most dangerous criminal syndicate in the world . Ullstein Verlag, 1997, ISBN 978-3-548-35713-3
  • Jürgen Roth: Mafialand Germany (Chapter: Russian Mafia ), Eichborn-Verlag, 2009, ISBN 978-3-8218-5632-2
  • Ulrich Schmid: Merciless brotherhoods. Rise of the Russian Mafia . Schöningh Verlag, January 1996, ISBN 978-3-506-77902-1
  • Rolf Uesseler: The Mafia Challenge. Organized Crime Strategies . Dietz Verlag, September 1997, ISBN 978-3-8012-0192-0

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 58, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  2. ↑ Yuri Shchekochichin: Лев прыгнул! , Literaturnaja gazeta, July 20, 1988, accessed May 24, 2020.
  3. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, p. 1; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  4. ↑ Yuri Shchekochichin: Лев прыгнул! , Literaturnaja gazeta, July 20, 1988, accessed May 24, 2020.
  5. ↑ Yuri Shchekochichin: Лев прыгнул! , Literaturnaja gazeta, July 20, 1988, accessed May 24, 2020.
  6. ↑ Yuri Shchekochichin: Лев прыгнул! , Literaturnaja gazeta, July 20, 1988, accessed May 24, 2020.
  7. ↑ Yuri Shchekochichin: Лев прыгнул! , Literaturnaja gazeta, July 20, 1988, accessed May 24, 2020.
  8. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, p. 1; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  9. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, p. 1; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  10. ↑ Georgij Rozhnow: ПОЛПРЕДЫ РОССИЙСКОЙ МАФИИ успешно обживают дальнее зарубежье , Ogonjok, from November 11, 1996, No. 46, p. 4, accessed on May 22, 2020.
  11. ↑ Ivan Swistunow: Мафии продолжают объединяться , Kommersant, October 28, 1995, No. 201, p. 19, accessed on May 23, 2020; Der Spiegel: "Expect no grace" , 11/1995, p. 183, accessed on May 25, 2020.
  12. ↑ Alexandr Akimov, Gennadi Kazakevitch: 30 Years Since the Fall of the Berlin Wall. Turns and Twists in Economies, Politics, and Societies in the Post-Communist Countries, Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore 2020, p. 89, ISBN 978-981-1503-16-0 .
  13. ↑ Alexandr Akimov, Gennadi Kazakevitch: 30 Years Since the Fall of the Berlin Wall. Turns and Twists in Economies, Politics, and Societies in the Post-Communist Countries, Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore 2020, p. 89, ISBN 978-981-15-0316-0 .
  14. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, pp. 1–2; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  15. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, pp. 1–2; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  16. ↑ Interpol: Project Millennium , accessed May 26, 2020.
  17. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, pp. 3–4; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  18. ^ Swiss Service for Analysis and Prevention: Organized Crime and Intelligence Service from the CIS , June 2007, pp. 4–5; Russian translation under: Сотрудничество ФСБ и ОПГ. Аналитический отчет контрразведки Швейцарии , May 16, 2016, accessed May 21, 2020.
  19. ↑ Der Spiegel: “Expect no grace” , 11/1995, p. 183, accessed on May 25, 2020.
  20. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 61 f, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  21. ↑ YouTube channel EuroMaydan: Радиоинтервью. Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман про криминальный мир СНГ , October 23, 2014, accessed June 3, 2020.
  22. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  23. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  24. ↑ Wladimir Kozlowski: БРИГАДА МАГАДАНА , sovsekretno.ru, from November 11, 2015, accessed on May 28, 2020.
  25. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  26. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  27. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  28. ↑ Encyclopedia Novobudow: Бизнес-центр Киев-Донбасс, Киев, Пушкинская, Толстого , accessed on June 5, 2020.
  29. ↑ Sergei Waris (pseudonym): Империя Могилевича: Тополов, Левин и другие , kyiv.osp-ua.info, from July 6, 2017, accessed on June 5, 2020.
  30. ↑ Sergei Waris (pseudonym): Империя Могилевича: Тополов, Левин и другие , kyiv.osp-ua.info, from July 6, 2017, accessed on June 5, 2020.
  31. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  32. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  33. ↑ Vladimir Abrosimov: "НАДРА" КИНУЛИ "УКРСИБ" , Ukraina Kriminalnaja, August 6, 2004, accessed on June 5, 2020.
  34. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  35. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  36. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  37. ↑ Seva Kaplan's YouTube channel: 5 лет спустя: Леонид Ройтман в Толковище с Севой Капланом , March 22, 2019, accessed June 6, 2020.
  38. ↑ Sergei Waris (pseudonym): Империя Могилевича: Тополов, Левин и другие , kyiv.osp-ua.info, from July 6, 2017, accessed on June 5, 2020.
  39. ↑ Vladimir Abrosimov: "НАДРА" КИНУЛИ "УКРСИБ" , Ukraina Kriminalnaja, August 6, 2004, accessed on June 5, 2020.
  40. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  41. ↑ UBR: Тополов Виктор Семенович , accessed on June 5, 2020.
  42. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  43. ↑ Radio interview Seva Kaplan Leonid Roitman: Криминальный авторитет Леонид Ройтман на "радио исповедь" у Севы Каплана , dated 24 January 2015 transcription of the interview: что рассказал Ройтман о руководстве страны: Могилевич и Украина , from 5 February 2015 recalled, on June 5, 2020.
  44. ↑ Georgij Rozhnow: ПОЛПРЕДЫ РОССИЙСКОЙ МАФИИ успешно обживают дальнее зарубежье , Ogonjok, from November 11, 1996, No. 46, p. 4, accessed on May 22, 2020.
  45. ↑ Maksim Warywdin: Визит делегации МВД Австрии в Россию. Новые русские мешают жить старым австрийцам , Kommersant, October 13, 1995, No. 190, p. 14, accessed on May 25, 2020.
  46. ↑ Ivan Swistunow: Слухи о российской мафии в Австрии. Австрийские власти озабочены количеством русских девушек , Kommersant, January 20, 1995, No. 9, accessed May 25, 2020.
  47. ↑ Kommersant: Заметка "Русская мафия беспокоит Вену" в газете Die Welt 14/15 января 1995 года , from October 13, 1995, No. 190, p. 14, accessed on May 25, 2020.
  48. ↑ Parliament of the Republic of Austria: Stenographic Protocol. 121st meeting of the National Council of the Republic of Austria , on May 14, 1998, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  49. ↑ Parliament of the Republic of Austria: Stenographic Protocol. 121st meeting of the National Council of the Republic of Austria , on May 14, 1998, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  50. ↑ Ivan Swistunow: Слухи о российской мафии в Австрии. Австрийские власти озабочены количеством русских девушек , Kommersant, January 20, 1995, no. 9; Kommersant: Заметка "Русская мафия беспокоит Вену" в газете Die Welt 14/15 января 1995 года , from October 13, 1995, no. 190, p. 14; Dominik Schreiber, Kid Möchel: Mafiareport III: The trace of the Mafia in Austria , Kurier, from February 17, 2019, accessed on May 25, 2020.
  51. ↑ Dominik Schreiber, Kid Möchel: Mafiareport III: The trace of the Mafia in Austria , Kurier, from February 17, 2019, accessed on May 25, 2020.
  52. ↑ Parliament of the Republic of Austria: Written question from Federal Councilors Dr. Peter Kapral and comrades , July 25, 1996, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  53. ^ Wien.orf.at: Russian mafia killer arrested in Vienna , from February 26, 2014
  54. ↑ Vladimir Sharapov: Кровавый счет. Он собрал отряд киллеров и держал в страхе всю Сибирь: как поймали бандита Челентано , lenta.ru, accessed on July 9, 2019,.
  55. ↑ Der Standard: Haban Trial: Judgment before Christmas , December 18, 2000, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  56. ↑ Parliament of the Republic of Austria: Stenographic Protocol. 121st meeting of the National Council of the Republic of Austria , on May 14, 1998, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  57. ↑ Vitaly Sitnikov: Еще пять звезд появилось на гостиничном небе Москвы , Kommersant, February 6, 1993, No. 21, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  58. ↑ Die Welt: Russian Mafia Murder Shakes Vienna , July 16, 1996, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  59. ↑ Parliament of the Republic of Austria: Stenographic Protocol. 121st meeting of the National Council of the Republic of Austria , on May 14, 1998, accessed on May 26, 2020.
  60. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , the Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp 29-30, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020th
  61. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 69, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  62. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , the Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp 29-30, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020th
  63. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , the Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp 29-30, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020th
  64. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 69, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  65. ↑ North Data: S & L IBA GmbH Industrievertretung-Betriebsconsulting-Außenhandel, Wendlingen a. Neckar , accessed on May 27, 2020.
  66. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , the Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp 29-30, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020th
  67. ^ N-tv news television: Russian mafia is spreading in Germany . In: n-tv.de . ( n-tv.de [accessed on November 9, 2017]).
  68. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, p. 42 f, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  69. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 68, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  70. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 70, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  71. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp. 32 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  72. ↑ Kommersant: Чем известен криминальный авторитет Таро , April 9, 2019, accessed June 21, 2020.
  73. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, p. 33, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
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  75. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, p. 34, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  76. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp. 37 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  77. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, p. 39 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  78. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 71, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  79. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp. 35 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  80. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 69 f, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  81. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 70, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  82. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp. 45 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  83. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp. 45 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  84. ↑ Walter Kegö, Alexandru Molcean: Russian Speaking Organized Crime Groups in the EU , Institute for Security and Development Policy, March 2011, pp. 45 ff, ISBN 978-91-86635-05-3 , accessed on May 26, 2020.
  85. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 68, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  86. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 71, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  87. ↑ Gernot W. Morbach: TERRORISM AND ORGANIZED CRIME: THE ALLIANCE OF TOMORROW? HOW TO COUNTER A POSSIBLE FUTURE THREAT, June 1998, p. 73, digitized under: Homeland Security Digital Library .
  88. ^ Committee on Governmental Affairs: RUSSIAN ORGANIZED CRIME IN THE UNITED STATES. HEARING BEFORE THE PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS. ONE HUNDRED FOURTH CONGRESS. SECOND SESSION. May 15, 1996 , US Government Printing Office, Washington 1996, pp. 86-87, ISBN 0-16-053632-4 , accessed May 21, 2020.
  89. ↑ Wladimir Kozlowski: БРИГАДА МАГАДАНА , sovsekretno.ru, from November 11, 2015, accessed on May 28, 2020.
  90. ^ For a Departed Mobster, Wreaths and Roses but No Tears , NYT, October 13, 2009
  91. ↑ Ivan Swistunow: Мафии продолжают объединяться , Kommersant, October 28, 1995, No. 201, p. 19, accessed on May 23, 2020.