Pandora Papers: Questions over Tory donations by ex-Russian minister's wife

The Conservative Party is facing fresh questions about donations made by the wife of a former Russian minister.

Lubov Chernukhin is one of the biggest donors to the Tories, giving more than £1.8m since 2012.

Leaked documents reveal her personal wealth comes from her husband Vladimir. He has been financially linked to people who were close to the Kremlin.

Mrs Chernukhin's lawyers say she is a British citizen and is entitled to do as she wishes with her money.

Her donations to the Conservative Party have given the 48-year-old access to figures at the top of UK government.

Mrs Chernukhin's winning auction bids have seen her play tennis with Boris Johnson and dine with Theresa May, when she was prime minister.

But until now, very little has been known about the Chernukhins' wealth and where it comes from.

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The documents in the Pandora Papers leak of internal files and correspondence from offshore financial firms show the couple are linked to a network of 32 companies, three trusts and more than £100m in assets.

The documents indicate that Mrs Chernukhin's wealth comes from her husband, with one email describing her as being "financially supported by her husband", and another as "a housewife".

One document shows Mr Chernukhin's offshore company loaned £4m to his wife's UK company.

The latest revelations follow separate allegations about two businessmen linked to donations to the party.

• Mohammed Amersi, who had given nearly £525,000 to the Tories since 2018, was involved in one of Europe's biggest corruption scandals that resulted in a telecoms company being fined $965m (£700m) in a US prosecution

• A businessman whose companies donated to 34 Conservative MPs is alleged to have made millions from one of Russia's largest fraud scandals. Former oil executive Victor Fedotov is the owner of a company behind a controversial infrastructure project in the English Channel, which is currently awaiting UK government approval

Both men deny any wrongdoing.

Working with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and the Guardian, BBC Panorama has had access to almost 12 million documents files from 14 companies in countries including the British Virgin Islands, Belize, Cyprus and Switzerland.

The Conservative Party say all donations have been properly and lawfully declared and followed all the rules.

Asked about the revelations about party donors that have emerged from the Pandora Papers investigation, the prime minister said all party donations are "'vetted in the normal way in accordance with rules set up by the Labour government", adding: "So we vet them the whole time".

The main political parties including Labour and the Liberal Democrats have all faced calls to hand donations back over the years.

Meanwhile, in response to the claims, Transparency International UK says that vetting process for all political donors in the UK is "little more than a box-ticking exercise".

"It's easy to evade the rules or not look too closely. We must do better," they add.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak said HM Revenue & Customs will examine the leaked papers "to see if there's anything we can learn".

Sacked by Putin

The Russian-born Chernukhins are both now British citizens.

Pandora Papers documents reveal how they secretly acquired properties in the UK through offshore companies.

They purchased a house overlooking Regents Park in London now worth £38m, as well as a mansion in Oxfordshire bought for £10m.

Mr Chernukhin, 52, a former deputy minister of finance under Vladimir Putin left Russia for London in 2004 after being sacked by the president.

The Pandora Papers investigation found evidence that suggests Mr Chernukhin abused his position as the government appointed head of a state bank to advance his private business interests.

In evidence to a court hearing in London in 2018, Mr Chernukhin testified how he had reached an arrangement with the former mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov, to secure planning permission for a development he had a secret personal interest in.

In return Mr Chernukhin told the court he proposed helping the mayor in relation to two other development sites in Moscow in which his bank had an interest.

He told the court: "As a part of negotiations or agreement with them how to proceed, we agreed... that I will help them", "and Mr Luzhkov will help me". 

Andrew Mitchell QC, a leading corruption barrister, told Panorama: "That's a conflict, there's no two ways about it. Here is a man who's chairman of the bank, using the bank as a mean by which he enhances his own personal wealth. And that has corruption written all over it."

Pandora Papers files also show Mr Chernukhin has carried on doing business with people close to the Kremlin.

They reveal his secret involvement in a property deal in St Petersburg in 2017, in which his partner was the wife of a then Russian government minister. He sold his stake in the property the following year for $30m, the documents show.

Questioned in 2018 about the Chernukhin's wealth, Mr Johnson - then foreign secretary - said "all possible checks have been made and... will continue to be made" on donations.

Asked whether the donations to the Conservatives should be declared as coming from Mr Chernukhin as well, political law expert Gavin Millar QC said: "If it's joint money, if it's family money, why isn't he willing to have his name alongside hers in the quarterly return to the Electoral Commission, publicly identified as a donor, and the source of the money?"

He added: "When you've got somebody who's a prominent associate of people who are connected with the Kremlin and… with Russian government, you would have thought any British political party… would start to investigate it and ask why that money is being given."

Lawyers for the Chernukhins said Panorama's interpretation of the court case involving Mr Chernukhin was a "gross mis-characterisation".

They said "the suggestion that he acted improperly whilst an official of the state is wholly untrue" and he "has not accumulated his wealth.... in a corrupt manner".

The lawyers said it was not accepted that any of Mrs Chernukhin's political donations have been funded by improper means or affected by the influence of anyone else.

'No red flags'

Labour and the Liberal Democrats have both said the Tories should return the money donated by Mohamed Amersi.

Investigations by the BBC and its media partners have indicated the businessman was involved in negotiations for Swedish telecoms company Telia that resulted in $220m being paid to a Gibraltar-based company controlled by the daughter of the then president of Uzbekistan. The payment was described by the US authorities as a "$220m bribe".

Mr Amersi has denied wrongdoing and his lawyers said the offshore company had been "vetted and approved by Telia" and that its involvement "did not raise any red flags" to him.

Representatives for Mr Amersi said on Monday he had "never knowingly facilitated corrupt transactions" and the Pandora Papers reports sought to "embarrass the Conservative Party".

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesperson Christine Jardine said: "The Electoral Commission should launch an immediate investigation into these allegations."

The Labour Party chairwoman Anneliese Dodds said the allegations were "concerning".

Referring to comments by Mr Amersi earlier this year that high-spending donors have been able to gain meetings with the prime minister and chancellor, she added: "The Conservatives should return the money he donated to them and come clean about who else is getting exclusive access".

Elsewhere, the Russian government has dismissed allegations of financial impropriety involving President Putin contained in the documents leak.

Other world leaders, including Jordan's King Abdullah, and the Czech Prime Minister, Andrej Babis, have also rejected allegations concerning the secret purchase of properties using offshore companies.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan has said his government will investigate citizens linked to the leak. Hundreds of Pakistanis, including members of Mr Khan's cabinet, are said to have had secretly moved wealth through offshore companies.

Update 3 December 2021: Following publication, Mr and Mrs Chernukhin have made legal complaints about this article. They say that the article is defamatory of them. In their complaint, they have told the BBC that no deal (corrupt or otherwise) was ultimately concluded with Mayor Luzhkov in respect of the properties in Moscow.

The Pandora Papers is a leak of almost 12 million documents and files exposing the secret wealth and dealings of world leaders, politicians and billionaires. The data was obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists in Washington DC and has led to one of the biggest ever global investigations. More than 600 journalists from 117 countries have looked at the hidden fortunes of some of the most powerful people on the planet. BBC Panorama and the Guardian have led the investigation in the UK.

Images from: BBC, London News Pictures, Central News

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Watch Pandora Papers: Political Donors Exposed on BBC One at 19.35 BST on Monday (UK viewers only) or later on iPlayer