Word: putin
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...decry the system that produces people like him, to live among the powerful while lambasting those who lord it over others. Before the global downturn, which Lebedev says has cost him $1 billion, he was a predictable, if persistent, critic of former President and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, routinely calling for an independent legislature, a free press and free elections, and a crackdown on corruption. Improving his image has been the Moscow tabloid he co-owns, Novaya Gazetta, which is known for publishing stories on the war in Chechnya, bribe-seeking officials and the nation's abysmal public services...
...since the Russian stock markets crashed in mid-September - Bloomberg has reported that Russia's top 25 wealthiest people have lost a collective $230 billion - Lebedev's campaign has acquired a new urgency. He has ridiculed the efforts of Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev to revive the economy, including bailouts for the oligarchs that he estimates at roughly $11 billion. He has announced plans for an English-language radio channel in Moscow; bought the London newspaper the Evening Standard; announced plans to launch a democratic political party with former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev; and (briefly) run for mayor of Sochi...
...sometimes works and sleeps, Lebedev gave me a condensed history of the Russian state since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 - the beginnings of post-Soviet capitalism, the rise of the oligarchs, the loans-for-shares scandal, his acquisition of National Reserve Bank, the rise of Putin, the fall of the oligarchs, his 28% stake in Aeroflot, the Khodorkovsky affair, the forthcoming launch of his restaurant in London, the end of democracy in Russia, Davos, and fellow oligarch (and Chelsea Football Club owner) Roman Abramovich. (See pictures of EURO 2008 soccer...
...State I ask Lebedev where the word oligarch comes from. "I think it was invented by Berezovsky somewhere in the '90s," he says dismissively, referring to Boris Berezovsky, the former oil and media magnate who prospered during Yelstin's rule but fled Russia facing accusations of fraud after Putin took charge. For most of that decade, between five and 10 businessmen (most notably Berezovsky, Mikhail Fridman, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Vladimir Potanin and Vladimir Gusinsky) ruled Russia. Their power reached its height at Yeltsin's re-election as President in 1996 - the same oligarchs who financed Yeltsin's campaign went...
Herein lies the reason for Lebedev's split personality. He is indeed an oligarch - the Russian magazine Finans reported that he was the 25th wealthiest person in the country in 2008, up from No. 46 in 2007. But he has never bent the knee to Putin. In Lebedev we find, if you like, the good oligarch - the Russian with whom Westerners can do business. He has made friends with prominent people in London (Elton John, Margaret Thatcher) and Hollywood (Kevin Spacey, John Malkovich), floating freely between boardrooms and state dinners. In March, Lebedev traveled to Washington with Gorbachev...