A cache of leaked emails has revealed the luxury lifestyle of Russia’s deputy defence minister and his socialite ex-wife, complete with St Tropez villas, yachts and Rolls-Royces.
Investigators from the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK), been established by Alexei Navalny, the jailed opposition leader, acquired 8,000 messages sent over 12 years which detail the extraordinary privilege and excesses of Timur Ivanov and Svetlana Maniovich.
The foundation is calling for Maniovich to be barred from travel in the European Union over her ex-husband’s role in the war in Ukraine.
Maniovich’s family spent €850,000 on villa rentals in St Tropez and €250,000 on yachts between 2013 and 2018
It said her “pre-emptive” divorce from Ivanov last summer allowed her to avoid the EU sanctions that were later applied to her husband. The emails suggest no actual separation took place.
Maniovich married Ivanov in 2009, following her divorce from the wealthy businessman Mikhail Maniovich. Ivanov was appointed deputy defence minister in 2016 after working for a defence contractor and is responsible for military construction projects, including the reconstruction of the ruined Ukrainian port of Mariupol.
According to Maniovich’s emails, her family spent €850,000 on villa rentals in St Tropez and €250,000 on yachts between 2013 and 2018. Maniovich has been shopping in Paris and Geneva, once paying €104,000 for a diamond ring and €150,000 for earrings.
Other purchases included a Dolce & Gabbana dress for €59,500 and a set of 19th-century furniture for €85,000, bought in Belgium.
Ivanov works closely with President Putin
A birthday party for Maniovich in Istanbul in 2018 cost €178,000, while her birthday near Moscow in 2021 was attended by President Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, and his wife, the former ice skater Tatiana Navka.
Ivanov, 47, and Maniovich, 50, have also allegedly kept a Rolls-Royce Corniche for their stays on the French Riviera.
Neither has responded to the claims made in the investigation.
FBK said that Maniovich’s bills were often paid by other people and corporations, one of them being Olimpsitistroy, a contractor for the defence ministry which is involved in constructing new apartment blocks in Mariupol.
The pair own a mansion in Tver Oblast on the bank of the Volga
On March 17 last year, as Russia bombarded Mariupol, Maniovich was picking up some diamonds from a jewellery store in Paris.
Maria Pevchikh, head of investigations for FBK, called on the French authorities to ban Maniovich from visiting France, posting a video of her “partying in Courchevel” in the Alps three weeks ago.
Pevchikh also announced a protest on Sunday, April 23, near Maniovich’s property in Paris, “demanding to sanction their family, freeze their assets and kick them out of Europe”.
Maniovich once spent €150,000 on a pair of earrings
Investigations by FBK have frequently recorded extraordinary wealth among Russia’s political elite, but no one has resigned or been prosecuted as a result.
In 2021, the organisation said that a billion-dollar palace had been built for Putin’s use on the Black Sea coast.
Six years earlier, the foundation had alleged that Sergei Shoigu, the defence minister, “hid” an $18 million mansion by registering it under the name of family members, including his 18-year-old daughter.
Navalny, 46, is serving eleven and a half years at a penal colony east of Moscow on fraud and contempt of court charges which he says were trumped up to silence him.
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