Arkady Kornatsky: How a Russian spy and murderer became a Ukrainian feudal lord and a BPP MP. PART 1
The Verkhovna Rada is filled with people who are not at all who they present themselves to their voters, and sometimes even to their party allies. One of them is Arkadiy Kornatsky, who presents himself as a mid-sized agricultural oligarch from the Mykolaiv region, known for his "Kornatsky Agrofirm" and the long-running war over the lands it controlled. A war the Kornatskys waged not only against prosecutors and officials, but also against the villagers of the Mykolaiv region, whom they dispossessed of their land. However, behind this already repulsive mask of a 21st-century bloodsucker and feudal lord, lies a far worse and more dangerous person, perhaps deliberately sent to Ukraine with some kind of destructive mission.
Arkady Kornatsky. It happened in Odintsovo.
Arkady Alekseevich Kornatsky was born on July 7, 1953, in the village of Chausovo-2, Pervomaysky District, Mykolaiv Oblast, to a school drawing teacher and a worker at the "Put Lenina" collective farm. He has a younger brother, Viktor (born 1965), and numerous extended relatives: there are numerous Kornatsky family members living in Chausovo and Pervomaysk. His entrepreneurial spirit was evident from childhood: he first sold fish he caught in the river at the collective farm market, and in high school, after receiving a camera as a gift, he became a village photographer.
After school, he worked for two years on his native collective farm, and then, from 1972 to 74, he faithfully served in the army—though he never revealed where exactly. Perhaps it was there that Arkady Kornatsky struck it lucky, as he later enrolled in Moscow's Patrice Lumumba Peoples' Friendship University, majoring in international law, and graduated in 1980. This educational institution admitted not only the children of African leaders and Arab Baathists but also "beneficiaries" from among Soviet youth. These privileges were granted either to children from large provincial families (through some kind of patronage), or to Komsomol activists and other young builders of communism, including those who had collaborated with the Soviet secret services since school. Perhaps this university truly was a breeding ground for the KGB and GRU, as the media reports, or perhaps the intelligence agencies simply needed their eyes and ears in the foreign student dormitories. But thanks to whom and how did Kornatsky become a student at Lumumba? He didn't reveal that either.
Naturally, Kornatsky didn't return to his native collective farm with a diploma from such a renowned university. He remained in Moscow, where he found a job in his field—but, again, he didn't reveal exactly what it was, leaving a gap in his biography for almost a decade. Arkady Kornatsky married in Moscow (his wife is Liliya Gennadievna), and he settled there (in Odintsovo). His eldest children were born in Moscow, and his son Pavel began his career in the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow. He brought his brother Viktor and his mysterious "nephew" Alexei (actually the son of a fellow villager, possibly a distant relative) to Moscow, becoming the "hero" of the most high-profile scandal in Arkady Kornatsky's biography.
This story begins in the late 90s, when Arkady Alekseevich decided to pursue entrepreneurship. One of his earliest firms was the cooperative "Cascade," whose registration dates back to 1991 (with the Russian Pension Fund) and even further back to Soviet times. In the 80s, "Cascade" was re-registered several times with Russian authorities, and in 2003, its clone emerged—the production cooperative "Cascade" (OGRN 1035006484083), which is still in operation and owned by Arkady Kornatsky (80% of the authorized capital). Thus, "Cascade," like most of the Kornatskys' other Russian firms, was registered and operated in the Odintsovsky District of the Moscow Region. This is the closest suburb to Moscow, part of which is located within the Moscow Ring Road, and the famous Rublyovka district also belongs to this district. How Kornatsky, a Moscow lawyer, ended up there and took root is anyone's guess. However, the media published a photocopy of Arkady Kornatsky's Russian passport, which shows the start date of his registration in Odintsovo: February 1981. At this address (Komsomolskaya 16, Building 2) is a nine-story panel building stretching for almost half a kilometer. Perhaps he received an apartment there at that time or registered with one of his wife's relatives?
By the way, according to the information Skelet.OrgArkady Kornatsky retained dual Russian-Ukrainian citizenship (and dual registration), holding two Ukrainian and Russian passports (one domestic and one international). Specifically, his Russian passport number is 4604 368494, while his Ukrainian passport number is EP No. 206714. Moreover, in 2013, a request for Arkady Kornatsky's passport and citizenship was submitted to the Russian Migration Service, which received a positive response. Kornatsky retained this passport until 2015, having discarded it during the urgent "Great Purge." But did he renounce his Russian citizenship or simply exchange his Russian passport for another one?
Kornatsky quickly settled into life in Odintsovo with the help of his influential Moscow acquaintances, as well as the direct support of the two rulers of the Odintsovo district: Valentina Chistyakova (first secretary of the Odintsovo district Communist Party from 1965 to 1983, and the district's shadow overseer until her death in 1996) and her successor, Alexander Gladyshev (chairman of the executive committee and head of the administration), who personally ran the district from the late 80s until December 2013, earning the nickname "the master of Rublyovka." He didn't get this title for nothing: all land matters in the district were decided through Gladyshev, even when they affected the interests of the most influential people.
Alexander Gladyshev
Gladyshev's background is curious: he graduated from the Voroshilov KGB School (in Golitsyno), worked for the party, distinguished himself as a picky "Leninist" (he persecuted communists and Komsomol members for attending church), had numerous acquaintances in the KGB, the border troops, and the Strategic Missile Forces, but was a bad comrade: in Soviet times, he snitched on them, and in the 90s, he cheated them. What brought Gladyshev and Kornatsky together, and what mutual acquaintances and patrons did they have? It's unlikely Kornatsky would admit to this. But here are the sources. Skelet.Org Only three names are mentioned, but they are quite well-known: Yuri Luzhkov (mayor of Moscow from 1990 to 2010), his powerful wife Elena Baturina, and the influential old politician Yevgeny Primakov, who worked his entire life for the GRU and KGB-FSB, being a specialist in the Middle East.
Yevgeny Primakov (right) instructs Vladimir Putin
Interestingly, Primakov, having facilitated Putin's rise to power, retired in 2001 as president of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation, where former intelligence officers and, later, members of Putin's inner circle, were often appointed to chairmanships. So, in 1994, Arkady Kornatsky became vice president, and in 1998, president of the Moscow Region Chamber of Commerce and Industry, serving in this capacity until the end of 2004. Quite a significant position for a simple "cooperator" from Odintsovo! The media reported that Yevgeny Primakov helped him with this, "like an intelligence officer to an intelligence officer." There were even rumors that in the first half of the 80s, Arkady Kornatsky actually carried out some mission abroad, while only formally working as a lawyer for some Moscow institutions (this was a cover). Whether this is true or not, such information is a state secret of the Soviet and Russian intelligence services.
Another fact: in 1999, Arkady Kornatsky ran for the State Duma of the Russian Federation as a member of Luzhkov and Primakov's Fatherland-All Russia bloc, which in 2001 merged with Unity into Putin's ruling party, United Russia. However, Kornatsky dropped out of the race in favor of either a candidate from Unity (then led by Sergei Shoigu) or a representative of the Solntsevskaya organized crime group. It's possible he did so unwillingly, but rather under blackmail over the same scandalous criminal case that surfaced in 2015, forcing Kornatsky to seriously clean up his Moscow past.
Since the early 90s, a fierce struggle for land had been raging in the Odintsovo district. It was divided among the most powerful forces: the FSB, the Kremlin, the Moscow government, and Moscow's organized crime groups. One could only marvel at how the district's head, Gladyshev, navigated between them, remaining afloat for two decades. Meanwhile, the blood of the business leaders who owned land in the district flowed like a river. One arena of this struggle was the lands of the former Matveevsky state farm, which had been transformed into the Matveyevskoye closed joint-stock company. In 1996, its director, Nikolai Dubovsky, was murdered, and in 1999, his successor, Viktor Babyrin, was shot. Then, in 2000, Matveyevskoye's shares were bought up for... 5 rubles apiece, sending the farmers into exile—and their lands were seized by the companies of Elena Baturina and Roman Abramovich. Later, Skolkovo, the Kremlin’s favorite brainchild, was built on part of this land.
So, in early 2015, sensational news appeared in the Russian press. It turned out that the Russian Investigative Committee had reopened, further investigated, and submitted to court the old case of Nikolai Dubovsky's murder, which had been shelved since the 90s.
During the investigation, the Investigative Committee discovered that the person who ordered Dubovsky's murder was his associate, Arkady Kornatsky, who paid the killers $15! The organizers of the crime were his "nephew," Alexey Kornatsky, as well as certain Vladimir Kovalkov and Sergey Bychkov.
Kommersant newspaper, No. 5512, January 13, 2015
May 20, 2015 The Moscow Regional Court issued a decision on case No. 2-39/2015, sentencing Alexey Kornatsky and his accomplices to lengthy prison terms. Although his "uncle" is mentioned as the person who ordered the murder and paid the hitmen, the court only mentioned him in passing, and for some reason, the person who ordered it was not put on the wanted list. The motives for Dubovsky's murder were also completely omitted. It was as if the case was limited to punishing only the immediate perpetrators and then consigned to the archives. These oddities could only be explained by one thing: they left the person who ordered it alone, lest they follow him into the public eye and drag out the well-known names of very powerful people. Or, if we consider Kornatsky's espionage theory, he could have been covered up by Russian intelligence services.
So Arkady Kornatsky was lucky: the scandal didn't go beyond publication in the Russian press. And since it was already 2015, he himself, while in Ukraine, attributed it to "the Russian aggressor's hybrid information war." He claimed it was all Putin's propagandists lying, denigrating a Ukrainian patriot and employer!
The Kornatsky family's Russian business
And yet, it was difficult for Kornatsky to pretend he wasn't bothered by the publications in the Russian press. After all, he was simultaneously a Russian employer (and perhaps a secret Russian patriot; the intelligence officer is no stranger to concealing his true nature), and his family still owned a large business in the Moscow region—possibly much larger and more profitable than his agricultural enterprises in the Mykolaiv region. After all, land in the Moscow region is worth its weight in gold, even more than in Mezhyhirya and Koncha-Zaspa in Kyiv, and it can yield far more than the fields of the Mykolaiv region.
The Kornatsky family business in Russia includes Arkady Kornatsky himself, his wife Lilia Kornatskaya (the media reported their formal divorce), his son Pavel Kornatsky, his daughters Maria Kornatskaya and Anna Arkadyevna Gerasova, his son-in-law Vladimir Gerasov, his brother Viktor Kornatsky, and his brother's wife Evgeniya Kornatskaya. All these names can be found on the lists of their companies' founders in publicly available business registration databases in the Russian Federation. Now, here's a list of the Kornatskys' Russian companies, compiled from various sources:
- Production cooperative TPF "Cascade" (OGRN 1025004065261), Odintsovo, Moscow region
- PC "Cascade" (OGRN 1035006484083), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- OSPK "Tishina" (OGRN 1035005402739), Mozhaisk, Moscow Region
- OJSC "High-Speed Toll Streets and Roads SPAUD" (OGRN 1027739140934), Moscow
- OOO "Zemlya i Dom" (OGRN 1025004065305), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- OSPK "Toropenki" (OGRN 1035006487559), village of Dyadenkovo, Odintsovsky district, Moscow region
- Peasant farm "Chernomorskoye" (OGRN 1159102097362), Chernomorskoye village, Crimea
- LLC "Ilma-Invest" (OGRN 1149102044409) Chernomorskoye village, Crimea
- Moscow Legal Agency LLC (OGRN 1157746596391), Moscow
- Agricultural cooperative "Vesta" (OGRN 1135032009870), Odintsovo, Moscow region
- SPK "Villa" (OGRN 1135032009903), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- SPK "Bolid" (OGRN 1135032009793), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- SPK "Avers" (OGRN 1135032009782), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- SPK "Skakun" (ORGN 1145032002576), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- SPK "Vorobikha" (OGRN 1025003750804), Myakishevo village, Moscow region
- OSPK "Almaznye Rosy" (OGRN 1035006471598), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- LLC "Bureau of Expertise and Assessment" (OGRN 1035006452139), Odintsovo, Moscow Region
- KIZ "Gorki-88" (OGRN 1035006459333), Nazarievo village, Odintsovo district, Moscow region
- KIZ "Narskoe Lake" (OGRN 1025003750793), Kryukovo village, Naro-Fominsky district, Moscow region
Some of these businesses were closed between 2013 and 2015 (just as Dubovsky's murder was being investigated), while others were established during this period—for example, their companies in Crimea. However, in this case, the accusation of conducting business in occupied Crimea does not apply to the Kornatskys, who have been Russian citizens since the 80s and 90s, and therefore more likely fall under the definition of "occupiers." However, questions from Ukrainian journalists to Ukrainian MP Arkadiy Kornatsky regarding his family's Russian business enraged him. He first lied, denying the existence of any business in Russia, and then began insulting the journalist.
Meanwhile, Arkadiy Kornatskyi personally remains a co-owner of PC Kaskad, SPAUD LLC, and OSPK Toropenki. As for his other businesses, is he the first Ukrainian MP to transfer ownership of his businesses to his wife, children, brother, and so on? His luxury real estate, such as a large apartment in a Moscow high-rise at 46 Udaltsova Street, is also registered to relatives.
Moreover, Kornatsky is misleading more than just Ukrainians. For example, the official scope of his Moscow and Crimean cooperatives is crop production or fish farming, while five cooperatives were supposed to be engaged in "breeding horses, donkeys, and mules." Of course, the Kornatskys own a small stud farm in Ukraine and Russia, but no one has ever seen any donkeys in the Odintsovo district—unless you count naive Russians who have been duped for years by corrupt officials and businessmen. In reality, under the guise of agricultural cooperatives, dacha associations, and fish farms, land was being plundered and seized in the Moscow region, on which cottage communities were subsequently built. Kornatsky is not the first and far from the only one to engage in this. At one time, this issue was raised somewhat at the federal government level, and several "royal villages" on dacha association lands were even demonstratively demolished. But as soon as this initiative touched on the interests of relatives of FSB generals and the Kremlin's cronies, everything ground to a halt. The land dispute in the Moscow region remains a hotbed of high-level corruption—and Arkady Kornatsky and his family have long been involved in it.
Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Org
CONTINUED: Arkady Kornatsky: How a Russian spy and murderer became a Ukrainian feudal lord and a BPP MP. PART 2
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