cover of episode The North Caucasian clan warfare behind a deadly dispute at Wildberries, ‘Russia’s Amazon’

The North Caucasian clan warfare behind a deadly dispute at Wildberries, ‘Russia’s Amazon’

2024/9/29

The Naked Pravda

I

Ilya Shumanov

K

Kevin Rothrock

Kevin Rothrock概述了Wildberries创始人塔季扬娜·金与其丈夫弗拉迪斯拉夫·巴卡尔丘克之间的公开离婚，以及由此引发的与俄罗斯北高加索一些最强大政治集团之间的冲突。这起冲突的高潮是9月18日在莫斯科Wildberries办公室发生的致命枪战。巴卡尔丘克试图强行进入办公室，并得到了车臣领导人卡德罗夫的支持。而金则得到了来自印古什和达吉斯坦的政治人物的支持，其中包括达吉斯坦的“影子州长”苏莱曼·克里莫夫。枪战导致两人死亡，多人被捕，但巴卡尔丘克奇迹般地逃脱了指控。 Ilya Shumanov详细分析了这场冲突的政治背景，指出这不仅仅是商业纠纷，更是北高加索不同家族势力之间权力斗争的体现。他解释了克里莫夫在俄罗斯政治和商业中的影响力，以及他如何利用其影响力帮助金促成Wildberries与RussGroup的合并。他还指出，冲突中各方都得到了来自执法部门的支持，这反映了俄罗斯执法部门内部的派系斗争。此外，他还分析了巴卡尔丘克试图强行进入办公室的目的，以及这起事件对俄罗斯企业袭击的未来走向的影响。他认为，这起事件是俄罗斯国有化进程和权力再分配的缩影，许多公司都面临着被强大的利益集团侵吞的风险，而这不仅仅局限于北高加索家族，还包括那些与俄罗斯安全部门有密切联系的势力。

Deep Dive

The messy divorce of Wildberries founders and the Wildberries-RussGroup merger fueled a deadly shootout at a Wildberries office in Moscow. This event highlights a conflict between powerful political groups in Russia's North Caucasus, involving Chechen and Ingush factions, each with ties to law enforcement and business.

Deadly shootout at Wildberries Moscow office
Involvement of Chechen and Ingush groups tied to law enforcement
Vladislav Bakalchuk's attempted takeover?
Two Ingush men died, dozens arrested, Bakalchuk escaped charges

Shownotes Transcript

Wildberries founder and CEO Tatyana Kim (who recently restored her maiden name) has been having a hell of a time shaking loose her husband, Vladislav Bakalchuk, but their very public divorce is just the tip of the iceberg in what’s become a battle between some of the most powerful political groups in Russia’s North Caucasus.

On September 18: Vladislav Bakalchuk tried to storm the company’s office in the Romanov Dvor business center — just a few hundred yards from the Kremlin itself. Bakalchuk has very publicly opposed the Wildberries-RussGroup merger and recently met with Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov to plead his case, winning the dictator’s support. At the Moscow office, Bakalchuk’s entourage had two former senior executives, but — more importantly — he was accompanied by former and current Chechen police officers and National Guardsmen, as well as trained martial artists from Chechnya, including former world and European taekwondo champion Umar Chichaev. According to Novaya Gazeta Europe), Chichaev fired his service weapon, though his status in the National Guard is a bit fuzzy.

On the other side of the conflict, defending the Wildberries office was another team of police and police-adjacent men with ties to Ingushetia. According to the newspaper Novaya Gazeta, Wildberries had recently hired a private security company with ties to Ingush State Duma deputy Bekkhan Barakhoev, who, until three years ago, worked as a vice president of a subsidiary of Russ Outdoor — the smaller company now merging with Wildberries. The most important shadow figure at Russ Outdoor, meanwhile, is Suleiman Kerimov, a billionaire senator from Dagestan.

The office shootout left two Ingush men dead and more than two dozen suspects in police custody, though Vladislav Bakalchuk miraculously escaped charges as a mere witness. He claims he merely showed up for a planned business meeting, but Tatyana Kim calls the incident a failed attempt at a hostile takeover. To learn more about this story and its broader political context, The Naked Pravda spoke to Ilya Shumanov, the general director of Transparency International-Russia in exile).

Timestamps for this episode:

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(3:08) The power struggle between Kim and Bakalchuk

(4:55) Suleiman Kerimov: Dagestan’s “shadow governor”

(7:20) The Wildberries-RussGroup merger and its implications

(9:47) Clan battles and regional tensions

(21:44) The future of corporate raiding in Russia

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