Ukraine’s top pro-Russian politician Viktor Medvedchuk has made up to $150 million by selling Russian gasoline to the U.S. despite being under sanctions, the Schemes investigative journalism project reported.
According to the investigation, a Russian oil refining plant owned by Medvedchuk’s wife, TV host Oksana Marchenko, sells gasoline to a Swiss company called New Coal, which is allegedly controlled by a member of the Russian State Duma.
The company later resells gasoline produced by Medvedchuk’s Russian plant to ExxonMobil Sales and Supply LLC. The gasoline is then transported through the port of Houston, Texas.
While ExxonMobil doesn’t directly buy gasoline from the politician under U.S. sanctions, retired diplomat Daniel Fried, a former coordinator for U.S. sanctions policy, told journalists that such business ties may lead to an investigation by the Office of Foreign Assets Control.
Medvedchuk’s illegal business empire
Schemes, a project of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, has long been following Medvedchuk’s secretive business operations.
In September 2018, journalists from Schemes discovered that Marchenko, through a Cyprus shell company, owns a Russian oil company called NZNP Trade, which has the sole right to extract oil from Russia’s Gavrikovskoe petroleum reservoir. The reservoir’s estimated reserves stand at 130 million tons.
Marchenko’s company also owns the Novoshakhtinsky Oil Refinery in Russia’s southern port city of Rostov.
Now, journalists have discovered where the company sells its products.
According to the international customs database Import Genius, in 2020, the gasoline from Novoshakhtinsky Oil Refinery was bought by ExxonMobil’s subsidiary and delivered at least six times to the Houston Port.
Read More: RFE/RL: Petroleum products of Medvedchuk’s oil refinery are sold to US where he is under sanctions
Using the Marine Traffic app, Schemes were able to track down the amount of gasoline delivered to the U.S.
Since January, at least 449,000 tons of gasoline have been transported to Houston from Medvedchuk’s oil refinery. The market value of such gasoline produced in Russia in 2020 ranged between $30 and $40 per barrel.
Medvedchuk’s supplies shipped to Texas are estimated at about $150 million.
Russian middleman
It’s not illegal to conduct business operations with the U.S., even if you are a Ukrainian pro-Russian politician and Russian President Vladimir Putin is the godfather of your daughter. But it is indeed illegal if one is under U.S. sanctions and he or she deliberately bypasses them with the help of proxies.
Medvedchuk has been under U.S. sanctions since 2014, when Russia invaded Ukraine. In an interview with the NewsOne TV channel, which he allegedly owns, Medvedchuk confirmed that he operates his wife’s Russian business.
“Oksana Marchenko, my wife, doesn’t do business — she owns a business — I run the business,” he said in 2018. “I can’t own a business, because ‘my favorite’ Americans introduced sanctions against me in March 2014.”
Read More: Media Grab: Oligarchs, pro-Russian forces use TV to push political agenda
To further cover his tracks, Medvedchuk used Swiss-based company New Coal as an official reseller of his gasoline to the U.S.
New Coal is officially owned by several low-profile citizens of Ukraine and Russia and specializes in reselling raw materials from post-Soviet states.
However, journalist Mikhail Maglov, head of the investigative Scanner project, told Schemes that the company is linked to Russian lawmaker Gleb Khor, member of Putin’s United Russia party.
In 2015, the self-proclaimed leaders of Crimea, the peninsula occupied by Russia since March 2014, awarded Khor a medal “for personal contribution to strengthening the unity, development and prosperity of the Republic of Crimea and in connection with the (so-called) reunification of Crimea with Russia.”
Crimean connection
Medvedchuk is also not shy about dealing with the Crimean occupation authorities. According to Schemes, the Novoshakhtinsky Oil Refinery sells its products to Russian-occupied Crimea, with the plant recording a record $46.5 million profit in 2019.
According to Schemes, Medvedchuk’s oil refinery uses several intermediaries to sell petroleum products to Crimea. Among them are Russian logistic companies Ug-Disel, ULK-Alliance and StroyPromInvest.
The products are transported to Crimea through the Kerch Bridge, which is illegal according to Ukrainian law.
Conducting trade with occupied Crimea is banned by the U.S., European Union and Ukraine.
