The US sanctions list includes TV presenter Tina Kandelaki, former Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov with his family, KamAZ and Tupolev companies, Bank of Moscow. The updated list is published on the website of the US Department of the Treasury.
In total, 57 people joined the list, many of whom are related to the Union of Donbass Volunteers, and more than 100 organizations, mainly related to the defense industry.
Together with Kandelaki, her husband, Vasily Brovko, was included in the list. In 2008, Brovko, together with his friend Oleg Berkovich, established the Apostol PR agency (later renamed New Strategy LLC), which began to deal with branding. One of the tools of the Apostol's image campaigns was a "farm" of Internet bots. Later, Brovko's wife Tina Kandelaki, who had extensive connections in the highest business circles of Russia, entered Apostol and brought large clients to Apostol, in which she became a co-founder and CEO.
In 2012, Apostol managed to obtain government contracts with the state corporation Rostec and the largest Russian air carrier, Aeroflot. For its work with Rostec, Apostol received $1.5 million, while Aeroflot paid 64 million rubles in 2012. The contract with the latter was concluded without a tender, that is, in violation of Russian law.
The close cooperation of the "Apostle" was not limited to corruption schemes in public procurement. In 2013, Brovko officially left Apostol and became director of communications, analytics and strategic research at Rostec. The co-founder of Apostol, Oleg Berkovich, was later appointed assistant to the governor of Sevastopol, who was called Chemezov's creature, and then headed one of the government departments. Together with Berkovich, a team of Apostol employees came to Sevastopol to “make a new city TV”. After the dismissal of the governor of Sevastopol, almost all of them went to work for the RTVI television channel.
In April, the United States imposed sanctions against the daughters of Russian President Vladimir Putin, the wife and daughter of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, as well as against Sberbank and Alfa-Bank. Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin and Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev were also sanctioned.
In addition to them, St. Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, Head of the Federal Customs Service of the Russian Federation Vladimir Bulavin, Plenipotentiary of the President of the Russian Federation in the North Caucasus Federal District Yuri Chaika, Head of the Presidential Administration Anton Vaino, Minister of Justice of the Russian Federation Konstantin Chuichenko , Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the North-Western Federal District Alexander Gutsan, Minister of Finance of the Russian Federation Anton Siluanov, Deputy Secretary of the Security Council Rashid Nurgaliev, Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev, Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the Volga Federal District Igor Komarov.
In June, the Ministry of Finance also included in the sanctions list the Minister of Construction and Housing Irek Fayzullin, the head of the Ministry of Economic Development Maxim Reshetnikov, the head of the Ministry of Transport Vitaly Savelyev and the official representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova.
