20/01/2018 WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as 'mafia state' | World news | The Guardian

WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as 'mafia state'

Kremlin relies on criminals and rewards them with political patronage, while top officials
collect bribes 'like a personal taxation system'

Luke Harding
Wed 1 Dec 2010 21.30 GMT

Russia is a corrupt, autocratic kleptocracy centred on the leadership of Vladimir Putin, in

which officials, oligarchs and organised crime are bound together to create a "virtual mafia
state", according to leaked secret diplomatic cables that provide a damning American
assessment of its erstwhile rival superpower.

Arms trafficking, money laundering, personal enrichment, protection for gangsters, extortion
and kickbacks, suitcases full of money and secret offshore bank accounts in Cyprus: the cables
paint a bleak picture of a political system in which bribery alone totals an estimated $300bn a
year, and in which it is often hard to distinguish between the activities of the government and
organised crime.

Among the most striking allegations contained in the cables, which were leaked to the
whistleblowers' website WikiLeaks, are:

Russian spies use senior mafia bosses to carry out criminal operations such as arms
•

trafficking.

Law enforcement agencies such as the police, spy agencies and the prosecutor's office
•

operate a de facto protection racket for criminal networks.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/01/wikileaks-cables-russia-mafia-kleptocracy 1/4
20/01/2018 WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as 'mafia state' | World news | The Guardian

Rampant bribery acts like a parallel tax system for the personal enrichment of police,
•

officials and the KGB's successor, the federal security service (FSB).

Investigators looking into Russian mafia links to Spain have compiled a list of Russian
•

prosecutors, military officers and politicians who have dealings with organised crime
networks.

Putin is accused of amassing "illicit proceeds" from his time in office, which various sources
•

allege are hidden overseas.

The allegations come hours before Putin was due to address Fifa's executive committee in
Zurich in support of Russia's bid to host the 2018 World Cup. Putin last night abruptly
cancelled his trip, complaining of a smear campaign to "discredit" Fifa members. In an angry
interview with CNN's Larry King Live, recorded before the latest disclosures, Putin also
denounced the cables and warned the US not to stick its nose in Russia's affairs.

He made clear he was not amused by a US diplomat's description of him as "Batman" and
President Dmitry Medvedev as "Robin". "To be honest with you, we did not suspect that this
[criticism] could be made with such arrogance, with such rudeness, and you know, so
unethically," Putin remarked.

The principal allegations stem from a Spanish prosecutor, José Grinda González, who has
spent more than a decade trying to unravel the activities of Russian organised crime in Spain.
Spanish authorities have arrested more than 60 suspects, including the top four mafia bosses
outside Russia.

In a startling briefing for US officials in January, Grinda said Russia was a "virtual mafia state"
in which "one cannot differentiate between the activities of the government and OC [organised
crime] groups".

Grinda said he had evidence – thousands of wiretaps have been used in the last 10 years – that
certain political parties in Russia worked hand in hand with mafia groups. He alleged that
intelligence officials orchestrated gun shipments to Kurdish groups to destabilise Turkey and
were pulling the strings behind the 2009 case of the Arctic Sea cargo ship suspected of carrying
missiles destined for Iran.

At the summit of what is known in Russia as the power "vertical" lies the Kremlin, a prime
beneficiary of the entrenched system of kickbacks, bribes, protection money and suspect
contracts.

In a detailed and apparently plausible analysis of how corruption in the capital works, the US
ambassador John Beyrle cited one source as saying: "Everything depends on the Kremlin …
[former Moscow mayor Yuri] Luzhkov, as well as many mayors and governors, pay off key
insiders in the Kremlin."

Beneath the Kremlin is a broad layer of top officials – mayors and governors – collecting money
based on bribes almost like their own personal taxation system. At the next level down the
FSB, interior ministry and police collect protection money from businesses, licit and illicit.

"Criminal elements enjoy a krysha [a term from the criminal/mafia world literally meaning roof
or protection] that runs through the police, the federal security service, ministry of internal
affairs (MVD) and the prosecutor's office, as well as throughout the Moscow city government
bureaucracy," Beyrle noted. "The Moscow city government's direct links to criminality have led

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/01/wikileaks-cables-russia-mafia-kleptocracy 2/4
20/01/2018 WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as 'mafia state' | World news | The Guardian

some to call it 'dysfunctional' and to assert that the government operates more as a
kleptocracy than a government."

Grinda said the FSB had two ways to eliminate "OC leaders who do not do what the security
services want them to do". The first was to kill them. The second was to put them in jail to
"eliminate them as a competitor for influence".

Sometimes the FSB put crime lords in prison for their own protection. Luckier crime leaders
might end up in parliament. "The government of Russia takes the relationship with organised
crime leaders still further by granting them privileges of politics, in order to grant them
immunity from racketeering charges," Beyrle noted.

The US is not alone in its assessments. In one cable, the Foreign Office's Russia director,
Michael Davenport, is quoted as calling Russia a "corrupt autocracy".

The cables also reveal that the Americans believe Putin was likely to have known about the
operation to murder Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006.

The Kremlin has denied involvement but a remark by another US ambassador in Moscow,
Williams Burns, sums up US attitudestowards the new Russia: "Whatever the truth may
ultimately be [about Litvinenko] – and it may never be known – the tendency here to almost
automatically assume that someone in or close to Putin's inner-circle is the author of these
deaths speaks volumes about expectations of Kremlin behaviour."

Russia's foreign intelligence chief said yesterday that he would order his spies to study the
cables relating to Russia. Mikhail Fradkov, the head of Russia's foreign intelligence service
(SVR), told the ITAR-TASS news agency: "There are many issues which have been revealed by
the disclosure by WikiLeaks – this is material for analysis. We shall report our conclusions to
the leadership of the country."

This article was amended on 2 December 2010. The original gave an incomplete name for a
•

Spanish prosecutor, referring to him as José González. This has been corrected.

Since you’re here …

… we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever but
advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news organisations,
we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can. So you can
see why we need to ask for your help. The Guardian’s independent, investigative journalism
takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our
perspective matters – because it might well be your perspective, too.

I appreciate there not being a paywall: it is more democratic for the media to be available for all
and not a commodity to be purchased by a few. I’m happy to make a contribution so others with
less means still have access to information. Thomasine F-R.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps fund it, our future would be much
more secure. For as little as £1, you can support the Guardian – and it only takes a minute.
Thank you.

Become a supporter
Make a contribution

Topics

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/01/wikileaks-cables-russia-mafia-kleptocracy 3/4
20/01/2018 WikiLeaks cables condemn Russia as 'mafia state' | World news | The Guardian

Russia

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/01/wikileaks-cables-russia-mafia-kleptocracy 4/4