Opposition politician Mikhail Khodorkovsky has issued a statement in response to an investigation by the Anti-Corruption Foundation, which claims that businessman Leonid Nevzlin was the orderer of the attack on Leonid Volkov in Vilnius in March 2024.
“Either this is true, and then Leonid Nevzlin has gone mad. Or it is an Efesbash provocation and a fake on which a lot of money has been spent. We have seen such provocations more than once, for example, in the Magnitsky case. For some reason, Maria Pevchikh confidently chooses the first version. For completely understandable reasons, I lean toward the second,” Khodorkovsky wrote in his Telegram channel.
He also emphasized that Nevzlin is his longtime friend, but their political views diverge. “It is well known to everyone that while maintaining personal friendships, in the political sense we take different paths. Leonid’s views on the future of Russia diverge from mine quite strongly. This is simply obvious on the basis of our public activities. Therefore, I cannot and do not want to prejudge his position,” he added.
Khodorkovsky called the attack on Volkov, as well as on ACF director Ivan Zhdanov in Geneva and economist Maksim Mironov’s wife Aleksandra Petrachkova in Argentina, “heinous crimes”.
“These crimes must be thoroughly investigated and the perpetrators punished. If the ACF wants to accuse me of something provably, they can go to court. And not slyly shitting on my reputation,” Khodorkovsky said.
According to him, he is not aware of any information about these attacks, except for that published in open sources.
“I am certainly ready to accept the result of the investigation of law enforcement agencies and the court of democratic countries, even if it does not coincide with my version. As far as I understood from the movie, both the ACF team and Leonid Nevzlin have already turned to the police,” the former Yukos owner added.
Alexei Navalny’s associates have released an investigation which claims that businessman and former Yukos top manager Leonid Nevzlin ordered the attack on politician Leonid Volkov and was also involved in organizing the attack on ACF director Ivan Zhdanov in Geneva and Alexandra Petrachkova in Argentina.
The ACF interlocutor provided Navalny’s team with first-person videos shot by participants in the attacks on Zhdanov in Geneva and Mironov’s wife Aleksandra Petrachkova in Argentina, as well as correspondence in which a person identified as Nevzlin discusses the attack on Volkov with a “contractor”.
