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[chadskin]

Such a wild story. Go here to read it in full: https://correctiv.org/en/investigations/system-putin/

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tl;dr:

• In November 1999, Vladimir Putin initiates the purchase of a computer network for the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office. US computer maker Hewlett-Packard, wins the deal although it does not offer the lowest bid. HP shows its gratitude and pays at least 7.6 million Euros in bribe money.
• The money ends up with Russian officials, including prosecutors and intelligence officials. Since then, no Russian general prosecutor has investigated Putin.
• The deal would not have been possible without German help: the HP transaction is covered by a Hermes export guarantee.

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The Leipzig State Court will soon make a ruling on a large corruption case. The prosecution accuses the US computer company Hewlett-Packard of paying at least 7.6 million Euros in bribes to Russian officials to secure a dominant position in the Russian market. But in reality, the documents reveal a much greater scandal. It was Vladimir Putin who enabled this corruption scandal. The bribe money from HP ensured Putin the loyalty of a clique of state attorneys. And helped him take control of the Russian judiciary.

Around 7.6 million Euros, one fifth of the entire sum, is designated as dirty money from the outset. This was promised by the HP representative in Russia – the German Hilmar L.

Hilmar L., who is now 63 years old, is well versed in dubious agreements. He is an astrophysicist who studied in the Soviet Union and later worked at the Central Institute for Astrophysics in Babelsberg. But he is also an informant for the Stasi, the East German secret police. Between 1980 and 1990, he goes to great efforts to spy on his colleagues.
He handles the political changes in Germany well and starts a career in IT in the early 1990s. In 1996, he becomes a manager for HP in Russia. At a business inauguration in 1999, Hilmar L. meets President Putin. The former Stasi informant meets the former KGB agent from Saxony. Did he approach Putin as a “colleague”? Or did Putin, whose spy service has access to countless Stasi documents, know about Hilmar L.’s former double life? Might this be why HP was awarded the crooked deal?

We do not know. Only one thing is for sure: according to German investigators, HP did not make the cheapest offer. Yet it still received the contract to provide the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office with a computer network.

At this point, Sergej B. comes into the picture – the Russian computer dealer who is friends with the Saxon Christian Democrat Ralf K. Somebody has to move the dirty money from HP to the corrupt Russian officials. An HP employee suggested Sergej B., now he gets to work with Ralf K., according to prosecutors. In early 2004 they have filled up the slush fund, then they start distributing the money.

Around 2.6 million Euros go to the London-based company Verwood Industries Limited – with no service in return. Prosecutors allege that Ralf K. transfers around 310,000 Euros to Bracefield Builders Limited in the UK – with nothing in return. A mysterious Marple Associated S.A. in Belize receives 632,000 Euros – with nothing in return. And so on. Via ever more dummy firms in various tax havens, the money finally reaches the Russian apparatchiks.

It gets even better. When all is done and dusted and every corrupt bill has been paid, there is still money left over – around 1 million Euros are left in the slush fund. Sergej B. directs his good friend Ralf K. to order display cabinets and safety glass – for renovating the Zarizyno Museum which is being restored by the city of Moscow.

Ralf K. does as told, according to the investigation by Dresden prosecutors. He transfers 945,371 Euros to the company Knauf/Kassel in Fuldabrück for display cabinets and 106,850 to the company Hanseata in Wentdorf for safety glas. Both companies deliver the goods to Moscow in 2007.

But when asked today, the Moscow office of the leading architect who chose the display cabinets states they were financed by the city.

For Hewlett-Packard, the bribery deal was immensely profitable: it helped HP gain a kind of monopoly position on the Russian market. According to the business plan “Troika”, HP’s turnover in Russia was supposed to rise from 700 in 2003 million to 2 billion Dollars in 2007 – with a profit margin of 42 percent. It appears that a 7.6 million Euro bribe brought HP billions in profits.

According to a criminal investigator, this was HP’s “golden ticket” to the Russian market.

The American judiciary has already taken action. In 2014, a US court convicted Hewlett-Packard to a fine of 108 million Dollars due to corruption and bribery payments in Russia, Poland and Mexico – whereby the Russian deal was particularly serious.

Oddly enough, the US case is not directed against the company’s management. At the time, this included a woman with significant political connections: Carly Fiorina, who is now a presidential candidate in the US Republican Party. In her candidacy announcement, she underlined her success in running the computer company. What did Carly Fiorina knew of the bribery payments in Russia under her leadership? She declined comment when approached by CORRECT!V.

The US judges drew on the German statement of claim which was initially examined by the District Court in Leipzig from 2012. After almost three years, the District Court recently handed over the files to the Leipzig State Court, and now the judges there have to decide whether or not to accept the case. Only then will the decision be made whether it will lead to a trial. But there are indications that the judges at the Leipzig State Court are now taking the case very seriously.

 

[jts]

Crazy, although not shocking (on Putin's side).

Wasn't actually aware of HP's ways. Man that's even scummier than the usual shady practices in the name of business, by any given company.

Makes me glad I stopped using their products, although I did it because they're shit.