| Notes |
Positive Russia charm offensive
The same month, June 2013, Lewin and Burnside founded the Positive Russia Foundation, an organisation designed to improve Russia's image in the UK. Lewin insists the foundation was his idea. According to Russian press reports, however, Shestakov was closely involved in setting up Positive Russia. Its purpose was to combat "anti-Russian propaganda" in the British media, Shestakov said.
The soft power project is the latest in a series of initiatives by the Russian government, which include the Kremlin propaganda channel Russia Today (RT). RT vehemently criticises the west, while ignoring the Russian state's authoritarianism. The St Petersburg news website Fontanka.ru – which interviewed Shestakov – described Positive Russia "as a new variant of RT, but under the patronage of English aristocrats."
According to Lewin, Burnside had also hoped to win a lucrative contract to promote sambo in the UK. In October 2013, "following conversations with Mr Shestakov", his company offered to arrange and promote a major sambo tournament in London. The 2014 event – named the President's Cup after Putin – would launch the sport on the world stage and "set a benchmark" for future UK-Russian relations.
New Century Media envisaged Putin handing the cup to the winning sambo team as well as a "prestigious black tie evening reception" afterwards. The PR firm promised "high-level dignitaries" from both countries would attend, including David Cameron, members of the royal family and Russian and British ministers. The venue would be Old Billingsgate Market.
The pitch explained: "Now one of Europe's most prestigious event venues, it hosts a variety of events throughout the year, including the Conservative Party's Summer Party, where Mr Shestakov was introduced to Prime Minister David Cameron this year by New Century Chairman David Burnside." The event would help rebuild Russian-UK ties, following "a slew of negative media coverage". The proposed budget, including Burnside's fee, was £1.5m. Lewin told the Guardian last week the contract "didn't go anywhere". But court papers show that New Century Media was earning huge sums during the same period from other wealthy Russian clients. It was also promoting Moscow, at the behest of Kremlin officials, as an international financial centre. One of the clients, Vladimir Makhlay, a businessman who fled to the UK in 2005, agreed to pay New Century Media £75,000 a month for strategic advice – "including support for Mr Makhlay's application for a British passport". Makhlay was allowed into Britain on an investor visa because he had "at least £1m" in British assets, the high court was told.
In return for £75,000 a month Burnside offered various services including "reputation management" and "personal introductions to an influential network of contacts". Makhlay, however, stopped paying after four months. New Century Media then sued in the high court, arguing successfully that the Russian had signed a year-long deal. According to election commission records, New Century Media donated £91,000 to the Conservative party in 2009 and 2010.
'This explains Cameron's spinelessness in relation to Putin'
The Guardian has learned that Burnside invited a senior diplomat from the Russian embassy in London to the same Tory fundraising dinner in 2012. The diplomat, Sergei Nalobin, is the son of a top-ranking officer in the FSB, the successor agency to the Soviet KGB. Nalobin's father was Litvinenko's boss in the 1990s.
"Nalobin wasn't supposed to be there. He was a last-minute addition. He spent the evening going round the tables, handing his business card to government ministers," one source said.
Nalobin played a key behind-the-scenes role in setting up the Conservative Friends of Russia, a pro-Kremlin parliamentary group. But the group collapsed in 2012, with key Conservative MPs resigning, following revelations of Nalobin's close links to Russia's powerful spy agencies.
Last week Lewin said the Positive Russia Foundation was still going – despite the sharp decline in Moscow-London relations following Russia's annexation of Crimea this spring. Although Cameron has condemned Russian aggression in Ukraine, Downing Street has so far not imposed visa bans on top Kremlin officials and oligarchs, many of whom have properties in London. Critics say the government is reluctant to act because it fears offending the City, for whom rich Russians are an important business.
Labour MP Chris Bryant, former chairman of the all-party parliamentary Russia group, said on Tuesday: "This shows the utter hypocrisy of David Cameron's Tory party and explains Cameron's spinelessness in relation to Putin. Voters will think that it's not just bizarre but despicable that Cameron will shake hands with, sit down to dinner with, and quite possibly take the money off, people such as these – the very people he is pretending to criticise over Crimea."
Burnside declined to comment. John Whittingdale MP, who sat with Shestakov on Burnside's table, said he believed that engaging with the Kremlin was the best strategy. Whittingdale, the chair of the British-Ukraine parliamentary group, said that he had a "robust exchange of views" last month with Russia's ambassador to the UK, Alexander Yakovenko. Lewin expressed similar sentiments. "I think isolating any authoritarian regime only makes it more authoritarian. If they [two opposing sides] don't speak to each other they end up throwing rocks over the fence."
Shestakov and Putin were members of St Petersburg's Yavara-Neva judo club. Many of the president's former sparring partners are now billionaires who occupy senior Kremlin positions. Shestakov declined to comment. |