Max Wegner: Who allowed a German swindler on the sanctions list to do business in Ukraine?
Max Wegner's name is primarily associated with the auto parts trade – he, along with his partners Vitaly Kungel and Alexey Erdle, are co-owners of Europe's largest online store for auto parts, AUTODOC. Anticorrosive
All three are German citizens, and it would be logical to assume that they are best known there. We don't know about Kungel and Erdle, but Wegner is also widely known in Ukraine. This repatriate from Russia, who went by the name Maksym Samov before moving to his historical homeland and receiving citizenship, for some reason chose Odessa as his patrimony.
It was here on July 4th that he pompously opened the AUTODOC operations office. It was pompous because the German Ambassador to Ukraine, Anke Feldhusen, was present at the event, speaking passionately and at length about European values, German investments in Ukraine in general, and AUTODOC co-owner Wegner-Samov in particular.
But Odesans know a different side of this "investor," one the ambassador likely doesn't know. And even if she does, she thinks such things are allowed in Ukraine—this isn't Germany, where everything must be done according to the law.
What we mean has been written about extensively and repeatedly. Therefore, we will only briefly recap. The fact is that in Odessa, Wegner is not known as a European investor or employer. He became famous here as a raider, a seizer of Odessa lands, and a destroyer of the city, which, thanks in part to him, is rapidly losing its reputation as a pearl by the sea.
The fact is that upon arriving in Odessa, Max Wegner became interested in the city's most valuable resource—land. He became acquainted with people brazenly plundering this land and constructing numerous high-rises and shopping malls along the coastline, in recreational areas, and in the city's historic center. He immediately got involved.
Thus, in partnership with the well-known Odessa developers, the Starovoitovs (the Megaline company), he began developing a plot of land previously owned by the Dynamo sports club and seized from it, allegedly for debts. Max Wegner's company, Varda Plus, newly founded and with a charter capital of just one thousand hryvnias, lent the club two million hryvnias using property as collateral. The athletes, naturally, failed to repay the loan, and Varda Plus seized the collateral and applied to the Odessa City Council for land to maintain these facilities.
In 2019, deputies allocated Wegner 68 acres of land by the sea between the border guards' beach and the beach of the Rossiya sanatorium, at 1/5 French Boulevard. A fence immediately went up, and construction is currently underway. This is just a plot, as the story itself has been described in great detail – it's quite murky and, naturally, has caused quite a stir in the city.
We're more interested in the companies involved in this scam, as Varda Plus LLC, the construction contractor, isn't the only one involved in this project. Megaline Project LLC is the contractor, and the Saint Bars service cooperative will be servicing these seaside apartments. While Megaline is a fairly straightforward matter—it's the notorious firm of local construction scammers the Starovoitovs—the other two are far more intriguing.
Here's what the registers say about these companies today:
Max Wegner: Who allowed a German swindler on the sanctions list to do business in Ukraine?
Max Wegner: Who allowed a German swindler on the sanctions list to do business in Ukraine?
Here's what the composition of the founders looked like at the time of their founding:
Max Wegner: Who allowed a German swindler on the sanctions list to do business in Ukraine?
The reason for such changes in the composition of the construction client, Varda Plus LLC, and the company that will service these apartments remains a mystery. Particularly interesting is why Wegner's name was removed from the latter, Saint Bars Construction Company.
Incidentally, both Varda Plus LLC and the Saint Bars service cooperative are subject to sanctions related to Russia's war against our country. These sanctions are imposed by the National Security and Defense Council, the US Treasury Department, Canada, the EU, Australia, the UK, Japan, and the US Department of Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security.
Max Wegner: Who allowed a German swindler on the sanctions list to do business in Ukraine?
Saint Bars looks especially odd on the sanctions list—it's essentially just a housing office, which hasn't even opened a single day yet. Isn't that why Wegner's name was removed from the list of founders? Because, apparently, the sanctions were imposed specifically because of him and all the companies he's involved with.
However, this is easily verified. According to the registers, Max Wegner is involved in one way or another with the activities of seven companies: the aforementioned Varda Plus LLC, Saint Bars OK, Ridotto LLC, Corp Estate LLC, Avtodok Ukraine LLC, Alisa Company LLC, and BRE Ukraine LLC.
And they're all on the same sanctions lists. So the secret to Max Wegner's removal from the founding of some of them appears to be simple: he and his partners, the Starovoytovs, are trying to avoid sanctions. Incidentally, they themselves also fled as founders of the Saint Bars service cooperative, not wanting to expose themselves to sanctions. Although it didn't help: all their companies, and they are involved with 26 different legal entities, are on the sanctions lists. The client of the aforementioned construction on the Odessa coast, Megaline Project LLC, and the entire Starovoytov family are also on the sanctions lists.
So it's not entirely clear who landed this entire coterie of international swindlers on the sanctions list. Most likely, Wegner and the Starovoitovs were sanctioned separately, and then fate brought them together through their overlapping interests in the Odessa region: the Russian-German swindler had the money, and the Starovoitovs had the experience and local knowledge.
Returning to the beginning of this article and German Ambassador Anke Feldhusen's visit to the opening of Wegner's store, did she know her counterpart's background? Probably not. But even if she had, what difference would it have made? Max Wegner, until convicted by a German court, is a respected German citizen. The fact that he's on eight sanctions lists stemming from Russia's war against Ukraine isn't a question for the German ambassador to ask about, as he feels so comfortable in Ukraine.
So the ambassador might have skipped Wegner's visit simply out of a desire to avoid being seen in his dubious company. And she has nothing to complain about for the visit. She should complain to Ukraine, primarily to the SBU and all the other law enforcement agencies that allow dubious individuals to feel at ease in our country.
And even more questions for the president and the National Security and Defense Council: why are you so vocally announcing sanctions, adding people and companies to them? What effect does this have? Avtodok Ukraine LLC, co-owned by Max Wegner, is also on these lists. So what? Did this somehow prevent him from opening an operational office in Odesa? And the owner of this premises is another company owned by Max Wegner – Alisa Company LLC, which is also on the same eight sanctions lists. So what – did this somehow prevent Wegner from buying premises in central Odesa and opening an office there, which is on the sanctions list? Did this somehow prevent him from snatching almost a hectare of beach and recreational area from Odesa residents?
The answer to these questions is both simple and bitter: money talks. Of course, no one caught Wegner handing over money to members of the National Security and Defense Council or SBU officers. But it's only a matter of time before a feud breaks out among them, and we'll find out who took how much from Wegner and from other swindlers.
I just want to ask one more question. This time, to the head of state. Vladimir Oleksandrovich, what answer were you expecting when you asked Biden why Ukraine isn't yet in NATO? Of course, the US President hardly knows about the sanctioned Max Wegner, who's carving up Odesa. But he certainly knows that the National Security and Defense Council, of which you, Mr. Zelenskyy, are the head, allows those on the sanctions list to feel at ease in Ukraine. And after all this, you expect our country to be respected and considered normal? As they say in Odesa, "Don't make me laugh."
P.S. Speaking of money, according to the publication "Lyubimiy Gorod," a representative of Varda Plus LLC paid $30 each to Primorsky Court Judge Viktor Mikhailovich Poprevich and Appellate Court Judge Natalya Viktorovna Gridina, who heard the case, to lift the seizure on the property at 1/5 French Boulevard (cadastral number 5110137500:48:001:0010) and unblock the construction. But this is just for reference, for one specific case.
Author of the article: Ruslan Yakushev
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