Shocking claims about how Roman Abramovich earned $12 billion fortune
Questions are being asked about how Roman Abramovich made his $12.3 billion fortune amid the Russian billionaire's ugly exit as owner of Chelsea Football Club.
Abramovich has been banned by the Premier League board from running Chelsea after he was sanctioned by the British government over his links to Vladimir Putin.
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Chelsea will now be sold, with Abramovich unable to profit from the sale despite pouring millions of dollars into the club throughout his 19-year reign.
Abramovich was among seven Russian billionaires added to a British sanctions list last week to try to isolate Putin over Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
European Union diplomats have embraced a similar move.
On Tuesday, bombshell claims emerged about how Abramovich earned his fortune, with the BBC publishing shocking claims revolving around bribery and prostitutes.
Russia's former chief prosecutor Yuri Skuratov told the BBC that Abramovich gained his wealth through "fraudulent deals."
According to the BBC report, Abramovich purchased Russian oil company Sibneft from the government at an auction for $250 million in 1995.
He then reportedly sold it back to the government for $13 billion a decade later.
The report alleges that Abramovich initially bought the company at a "rigged auction" through a "fraudulent scheme" with former business associate Boris Berezovsky.
Skuratov was Russia's Prosecutor General from 1995 to 1999 and investigated the sale at the time.
"Basically, it was a fraudulent scheme, where those who took part in the privatisation formed one criminal group that allowed Abramovich and Berezovsky to trick the government and not pay the money that this company was really worth," Skuratov told BBC.
However Skuratov was forced to resign in 1999 when a video allegedly showing him in his office with two sex workers was released to the public.
The scandal came amid a political battle with then-Russia President Boris Yeltsin, with Putin (then the head of Russia's spy agency FSB) confirming the authenticity of the video.
The video was released right before Skuratov planned to share the names of Russian oligarchs taking bribes from a Swiss firm.
"This whole thing was obviously political, because in my investigations I came very close to the family of Boris Yeltsin, including via this investigation of the Sibneft privatization," Skuratov added.
Abramovich allegedly admitted to bribing Russian official
Berezovsky reportedly sued Abramovich in 2012, claiming he had coerced him into selling Sibneft shares by blackmailing him, seeking billions of dollars in damages.
Berezovsky lost the case, but Abramovich admitted to giving Berezovsky $10 million at the time of the Sibneft purchase to pay off a Russian official.
On Tuesday, a jet linked to Abramovich landed in Moscow after taking off from Istanbul following a brief stop there.
The jet linked to Abramovich arrived in Istanbul from Israel on Monday, shortly after he was seen in Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion airport.
A British transport ministry source said on Friday that Britain was searching out helicopters and jets belonging to the sanctioned oligarchs.
Multiple properties including opulent yachts worth hundreds of millions of dollars have been seized by authorities in Europe in recent days.
Refinitiv ship tracking data showed Abramovich's $830 million yacht Solaris was underway using engine off the coast of Albania on Tuesday morning with the status "awaiting orders".
Its destination was shown as Turkey after taking off from Montenegro but that was removed late on Monday.
with AAP
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