Anti-Corruption Foundation

The Anti-Corruption Foundation (Russian: Фонд борьбы с коррупцией Fond Borby s Korruptsiyey, abbr. ФБК, FBK, literally Foundation for Combating Corruption) is a Russian nonprofit organization based in Moscow established in 2011 by activist and politician Alexei Navalny. Its main goal is to investigate and to expose corruption cases among high-ranking Russian government officials,[2] and it has accused the government of retaliating against it and its members several times for its investigations. The organisation is funded by private donations. Among other activities, the foundation publishes movies on YouTube about corruption of Russian officials, such as Chaika and He Is Not Dimon to You. The organisation is currently in liquidation following being ordered by a Russian court to pay ₽29.2 million to a company for "lost profits and damage to reputation" following an investigation into mass food poisoning of schoolchildren in Moscow. At the same time, the Anti-Corruption Foundation brand has been preserved.[3]

For other uses, see FBK.
The Anti-Corruption Foundation
Фонд борьбы с коррупцией
AbbreviationФБК, FBK
Formation9 September 2011
FounderAlexei Navalny
TypeNGO
Legal statusNon-commercial foundation (Article 7, NCO Law of Russia)
PurposeFighting corruption in Russia
HeadquartersMoscow, Russia
Director
Ivan Zhdanov
Staff
41[1]
Websitefbk.info?lang=en

Mission and creation

Anti-Corruption Foundation carries out investigations into corruption by Russian authorities. They are taking measures to prevent stealing of budget money. FBK also helps people make sure that authorities work correctly to provide normal conditions in the field of utilities sector, transport, roadways, elections, etc.

FBK Executive Director Vladimir Ashurkov formulated the fund's strategy as pressure on the authorities in order to push them towards internal reforms, working in two directions: organizing situations in which government structures will feel pressure, and creating a real alternative to the current power system.[4]

The Foundation was registered on September 9, 2011 (account No. 7714013315, OGRN 1117799018204).[5] According to Vladimir Ashurkov, the founders of the fund gained experience in public and transparent fundraising by organizing financing for the RosPil project. A significant amount was collected through the Yandex.Money payment system, which provided financial support for the project for a year. In parallel, the founders of the fund are working on the idea of involving on a permanent basis professional lawyers and economists in the search for and suppression of corruption schemes in the public procurement system. The contractual basis will allow to get some guarantees, in contrast to the scheme for working with volunteers.[4]

Notable investigations

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

2018

2019
  • Investigation of Andrey Metelsky, the deputy of the Moscow City Duma
  • Investigation of Lyudmila Stebenkova, the deputy of the Moscow City Duma
  • Investigation of Stepan Orlov, the deputy of the Moscow City Duma
  • Investigation of Kirill Shchitov, the deputy of the Moscow City Duma
  • Investigation of Alexei Shaposhnikov, the chairman of the Moscow City Duma
  • Investigation of Vladimir Platonov, the former chairman of the Moscow City Duma
  • Investigation of Natalya Sergunina, the vice-mayor of Moscow
  • Investigation of Alexander Gorbenko, the vice-mayor of Moscow
  • Investigation of Pyotr Biryukov, the vice-mayor of Moscow
  • Investigation of Valentin Gorbunov, the head of the MCEC
  • Investigation of Boris Ebzeev, the member of the CEC
  • Investigation of Nikolay Bulaev, the vice-chairman of the CEC
  • Investigation of Anton Siluanov, Russian Minister of Finance

2021

Financing

FBK is funded by money transfers from its supporters; mostly these are donations from ordinary people.[19] According to Ashurkov, “constant fundraising is a necessary condition for the functioning” of the fund. The creators want to build a system that will allow the fund "not to depend on one source of funding." In April 2012, the creators estimated the fund's annual budget at approximately $300,000. If more funds are available, the fund will expand.[4]

In 2013, the fund raised 23 million rubles through donations.[20] In 2014 the budget was 28.5 million rubles;[21] in 2016, it was 45 million rubles.[22]

First public sponsors

The first public sponsors of the fund on February 13, 2012 were the son of the founder of PJSC VimpelCom, businessman Boris Zimin (confirmed that he had already given 300,000 rubles and will give about the same amount every month) and former manager of Alfa Group Vladimir Ashurkov (confirmed that gave 300,000 rubles). On May 30, 2012, the list of the first 16 sponsors of the fund was announced:[23][24]

№ Name Notes
1 Vladimir Ashurkov Executive director of the Fund
2 Roman Borisovich Vice President of Rosgosstrakh LLC
3 Dmitry Bykov Writer
4 Sergey Grechishkin Managing Partner, Alcantara Asset Management
5 Sergei Guriev Former rector of the New Economic School
6 Ekaterina Zhuravskaya Professor at the Paris School of Economics and the New Economic School
7 Boris Zimin Entrepreneur
8 Kirill Irtyuga Partner of RosinvestHotel Management Company
9 Alexander Lebedev Chairman of the Board of Directors of the National Reserve Corporation
10 Artyom Lyubimov First Deputy General Director of Bolshoi Gorod CJSC (accounting services)
11 Leonid Parfyonov Journalist
12 Pavel Prosyankin Financier
13 Alexey Savchenko Director for Strategic Planning, Alfa Group Consortium
14 Denis Sokolov Entrepreneur
15 Victor Yarutov Businessman, co-owner of the Nienschanz Group of Companies
16 Boris Akunin Writer

According to Navalny, “they have already transferred 4.4 million rubles, and guaranteed another 4 million for the second half of the year”, which provides most of the planned annual budget of the fund ($ 300,000).[23]

According to Vladimir Ashurkov and Navalny, the negotiations took place for three months, and some of those with whom they took place eventually decided to refrain from making contributions to the fund. However, many of those who ended up supporting the project, despite not being bound by any contractual obligations, promised to make regular donations. This allows to plan the activities of the fund. In case of an increase in voluntary contributions, it is planned to develop the staff of the fund's projects, giving a special role to the anti-corruption "RosPil". Moreover, all business representatives support the fund financially as individuals.[23]

According to Navalny, in order to help potential donors decide to support the fund and similar projects, the first of those who have already done so will announce their names.[23] And Vladimir Ashurkov suggested that later the names of those who financially support the fund will not be made public, except for cases when the donors themselves ask for it.[23] Ashurkov said that Alfa Group's top manager Alexei Savchenko appeared on the list of sponsors thanks to his acquaintance with him.[23] Navalny noted that the fund has no other sponsors from Alpha.[23] Political scientist Stanislav Belkovsky noted the interest of representatives of big business in the opposition, highlighting Mikhail Fridman.[23]

As a funding strategy for the fund, Navalny stated the collection of small donations, but with the involvement of a wide range of donors, emphasizing the importance of mass support.[25]

Team
Volunteers and employees of the Anti-Corruption Foundation arrested on 26 March 2017

Current leadership
Position[26] Name
Founder of FBK Alexey Navalny
Director of FBK Ivan Zhdanov
Executive manager Vladimir Ashurkov
Press secretary Kira Yarmysh
Creative director Varvara Mikhaylova
"Navalny Live" YouTube channel producer Lyubov Sobol
Anti-corruption project "RosPil" Alexander Golovach
Anti-corruption project "RosYama" Anatoly Kravchenko
Head of Investigation Department Maria Pevchikh
Deputy Head of Investigation Department Georgy Alburov
Head of IT department Vladislav Romantsov

Team members

Nikita Kulachenkov is also part of the investigation department. The FBK project managers are Leonid Volkov, Anna Dodonova (also project #20), Ruslan Shaveddinov, Ilya Pakhomov, Maria Vysochina. The legal department includes: Alexander Pomazuev, Vladlen Los, Evgeny Zamyatin. Valery Zolotukhin is also involved in the RosPil project. In addition, the team includes fundraising manager Polina Smirnova, video production managers Anna Bogomolova and Vitaly Kolesnikov, mailing list manager Yan Matveyev, editor Maria Zakharova, office managers Kristina Kamenskaya and Olga Bulaeva.[26]

The director of the fund from 2014 to December 2018 was Roman Rubanov. Since December 2018, the head of the legal department of the fund, Ivan Zhdanov, has been appointed director.[27]

Since February 2012, the executive director of the fund has been Vladimir Ashurkov, who was forced to leave Alfa Group to work at FBK.[4][28]

Media

FBK created its own media, 'Leviathan', in order to have a possibility to register for press conferences of Vladimir Putin and make a request to authorities. Since 2016 it has been publishing one news item per day.[29] The name 'Leviathan' was taken from Leviathan, 2014 award-winning film by Andrey Zvyagintsev.

Films

FBK has made the following films:

Criminal case and "foreign agent" status

On August 3, 2019 the ICR opened a criminal case against the FBK, accusing them of laundering ₽1 billion (~US$15.5 mln).[30] Later the amount was reduced to ₽75 million (~US$1.15 mln).[31]

On September 5, 2019 searches were conducted at the FBK office and at the "Navalny LIVE" studio.[32]

Soon after the 2019 Moscow City Duma election, on September 12, 2019 the ICR carried out mass raids on the FBK regional offices in 40 Russian cities.[33][34]

In September 2019 various state-owned companies filed lawsuits against FBK for "organizing riots", and the courts partially satisfied them in the amount of ₽5 million (~US$78 000).[35]

On October 8, 2019 the police filed lawsuit against FBK for "costs of maintaining order during rallies" in the amount of ₽18 million (~US280 000).[36]

On October 9, 2019 the FBK was declared a "foreign agent" by the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation.[31][37]

On October 15, 2019 the ICR again carried out mass raids on the FBK regional offices in 30 Russian cities.[38][39]

In February 2019, FBK published an investigation that reported that in December 2018, mass food poisoning of children occurred in kindergartens and schools in Moscow. FBK blamed Concord Food Plant LLC, Moskovskiy Shkolnik LLC and VITO-1 LLC for this, which he linked with Yevgeny Prigozhin. Subsequently, Moscow schools No. 760 and No. 1554 assessed fines against Moskovskiy Shkolnik due to the supply of low-quality food.

In April 2019, Moskovskiy Shkolnik filed a lawsuit against FBK, Navalny, FBK lawyer Lyubov Sobol, who was in charge of the investigation, and its former employee Natalya Shilova, who was involved in the investigation.

In October 2019, the Moscow Arbitration Court ordered Navalny to pay 29.2 million rubles as compensation for lost profits and damage to professional reputation. The court ordered Lyubov Sobol and FBK to pay the same amount. The Court of Appeal upheld this decision.

In July 2020, Navalny said that he saw no reason to raise money to pay the "huge amount". He announced that the FBK would be liquidated, and that he and Sobol "until the end of Putin's power" would have to live with blocked accounts and bailiffs seizing any of their property in favor of "Putin's chef". Navalny said that he intended to revive the FBK shortly after as another legal entity.[40][41][42][43][44]

See also

References
  1. "Сотрудники" [Staff]. fbk.info (in Russian). Retrieved 2021-01-21.
  2. "About us". Anti-Corruption Foundation. 2020.
  3. "Соратник Навального: "Любое реальное расследование приведет к тому, что они выйдут на самих себя"" [Companion of Navalny: "Any real investigation will lead to the fact that they come out on themselves."]. BBC Russian Service (in Russian). 2020-08-29. Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  4. Badanin, Roman; Osipov, Ivan (2012-04-25). "«Я понимал, что сотрудничество с Навальным может быть угрозой для моей работы»" [“I understood that cooperation with Navalny could be a threat to my work”]. Forbes. Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  5. "Портал государственных услуг" [Government services portal]. unro.minjust.ru. 2020-12-15. Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  6. "Навальный нашел у Володина незадекларированную недвижимость" [Navalny found Volodin's undeclared property]. Forbes (in Russian). 2013-11-27. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  7. "Навальный нашел конфликт интересов в бизнесе сына Якунина" [Navalny found a conflict of interest in the business of Yakunin's son]. Lenta.ru (in Russian). 2013-09-17. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  8. "Пехтин ушел из Думы из-за скандала с недвижимостью в США" [Pekhtin left Duma due to real estate in the USA scandal]. BBC Russian Service (in Russian). 2013-02-20. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  9. "Навальный обвинил Собянина в нарушении закона о выборах" [Navalny accused Sobyanin of violating electoral law]. BBC Russian Service (in Russian). 2013-08-19. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  10. "Фонд Навального заявил о наличии трех офшоров у сенатора Фетисова" [Navalny's Foundation says Senator Fetisov has three offshore companies]. Forbes (in Russian). 2015-03-17. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  11. "Lawmaker Owns Undeclared Luxury Property in Dubai, Navalny Says". The Moscow Times. 2014-02-19. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  12. "Расходы Голиковой и Христенко на элитную недвижимость почти на 60 миллионов превзошли их доходы, подсчитали у Навального" [The expenses of Golikova and Khristenko on elite real estate exceeded their incomes by almost 60 million, according to Navalny]. NEWSru (in Russian). 2014-10-16. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  13. Eremenko, Alexey (2014-07-08). "Photos of 'Rotenberg Palaces' Hit the Web". The Moscow Times. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  14. Eremenko, Alexey (2014-10-30). "Russia's Pension Tsar Implicated in $8 Million Fraud". The Moscow Times. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  15. Walker, Shaun (2015-12-13). "The luxury hotel, the family of the top Moscow prosecutor and Russia's most notorious gang". The Guardian. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  16. Schreck, Carl (2015-10-27). "Russia's Shoigu Accused Of Owning Mansion". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  17. Eckel, Mike (2015-09-17). "Kremlin Spokesman Linked To $7.1 Million House In Latest Navalny Exposé". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  18. "Тимакова прокомментировала расследование Навального о «даче Медведева»" [Timakova commented on Navalny's investigation of "Medvedev's dacha"]. Forbes (in Russian). 2016-09-15. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  19. Zotova, Natalia (September 11, 2020). "Без Навального: как ФБК работает без своего лидера" [Without Navalny: how FBK works without its leader]. BBC Russian Service (in Russian). Retrieved September 13, 2020.
  20. Navalny, Alexei (2014-06-10). "FBK: report 2013. Stay tuned for further". navalny.com. Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  21. Navalny, Alexei (June 16, 2015). "Годовой отчёт Фонда борьбы с коррупцией" [Anti-Corruption Foundation Annual Report]. navalny.com.
  22. "Фандрайзинг" [Fundraising] (PDF). Anti-Corruption Foundation. 2017.
  23. Zheleznova, Maria; Rozhkov, Alexey; Khimshiashvili, Polina (2012-05-30). "Кто спонсирует фонд борьбы с коррупцией Навального" [Who sponsors Navalny's anti-corruption fund]. Vedomosti (in Russian). Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  24. Zheleznova, Maria; Rozhkov, Alexey; Nikolsky, Alexey; Plotonova, Olga (2012-05-15). "У фонда Навального может появиться новый источник средств" [Navalny's fund may get a new source of funds]. Vedomosti (in Russian). Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  25. Navalny, Alexei (2012-05-30). "16 смелых" [16 brave]. navalny.livejournal.com (in Russian). Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  26. "О фонде" [About the fund]. Anti-Corruption Foundation (in Russian). 2020. Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  27. Navalny, Alexei (2019-02-26). "По требованию Усманова и Медведева против бывшего директора ФБК возбуждено уголовное дело" [At the request of Usmanov and Medvedev, a criminal case was initiated against the former director of FBK]. navalny.com. Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  28. Kreknina, Alexandra; Yarosh, Yulia (2012-04-13). "X5 рассталась с менеджером из-за его политических взглядов" [X5 parted ways with manager due to his political views]. Vedomosti (in Russian). Retrieved 2020-12-16.
  29. "Левиафан" [Leviathan]. Anti-Corruption Foundation.
  30. Gubenko, Artyom (August 3, 2019). "СК возбудил дело об отмывании ФБК Навального 1 млрд руб" [The Investigative Committee opened a case on the laundering of FBK Navalny 1 billion rubles]. RBK Group. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  31. Mukhametshina, Elena; Krechetova, Angelina; Chunova, Alexandra (October 10, 2019). "Признание ФБК иностранным агентом призвано затруднить его участие в политике" [FBK's recognition as a foreign agent is intended to hinder its participation in politics]. Vedomosti. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  32. "Силовики в ФБК, в офисе "Навальный Live" и в московском штабе политика" [Security officials at FBK, at the Navalny Live office and at the politician's Moscow headquarters]. MediaZona (in Russian). September 9, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  33. "Суд разрешил провести еще 47 обысков по делу ФБК" [The court allowed 47 more searches in the FBK case]. Kommersant (in Russian). September 17, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  34. Bennetts, Marc (September 12, 2019). "Russian police carry out mass raids against opposition activists". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  35. "Суд вернул компании по аренде автомобилей иск к ФБК на 1 млрд рублей" [The court returned the car rental company a claim against FBK for 1 billion rubles]. Vedomosti (in Russian). October 16, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  36. "Полиция Москвы решила отсудить у оппозиции 18 млн рублей" [Moscow police decided to sue the opposition for 18 million rubles]. Interfax (in Russian). October 8, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  37. "Russia brands opposition leader Navalny anti-corruption group a 'foreign agent'". Deutsche Welle. October 9, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  38. "СКР сообщил об обысках по делу ФБК в 30 городах" [Investigative Committee of Russia reported about searches in the FBK case in 30 cities]. Interfax (in Russian). October 15, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  39. Walker, Shaun (October 15, 2019). "Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny condemns mass raids". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved October 28, 2019.
  40. "Московская школа выиграла иск на 1,5 млн рублей из-за поставок некачественной еды" [The Moscow school won a lawsuit for 1.5 million rubles for the supply of low-quality food]. Interfax (in Russian). April 4, 2019. Retrieved December 11, 2019.
  41. Duryagina, Kira (October 29, 2019). "Иск подают холодным" [The claim is served cold]. Kommersant. Retrieved December 11, 2019.
  42. Rozhkova, Elena; Glukhova, Natalia (July 21, 2020). "Алексей Навальный изменился в юрлице" [Alexey Navalny has changed in the legal entity]. Kommersant. Retrieved December 11, 2019.
  43. Kalyukov, Evgeny (October 28, 2019). "Навальный сообщил о взыскании ₽88 млн в пользу «Московского школьника»" [Navalny announced the recovery of ₽88 million in favour of the "Moscow Schoolboy"]. RBK Group (in Russian). Retrieved December 11, 2019.
  44. "Навальный объявил о закрытии ФБК. Вместо фонда создадут новую организацию" [Navalny announced the closure of FBK. A new organization will be created instead of the foundation]. BBC Russian Service (in Russian). July 20, 2020. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
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