Pugachyov Blames Interpol Listing on Top-Level Russians

Sergei Pugachyov, a former banker and confidante of Vladimir Putin, said he was placed on Interpol’s most-wanted list because of a campaign against led by the highest echelons of Russian politics.

Pugachyov, who faces civil and criminal trials in the U.K. and Russia over the 2010 collapse of International Industrial Bank, said Interpol’s involvement is illegal and he’ll explore “all avenues” to fight to get his name removed.

Pugachyov, a former senator, was added to the international law enforcement agency’s roster by the “judicial authorities of Russia for prosecution,” on charges of “misappropriation or embezzlement,” according to the Interpol website.

“The involvement of Interpol by the Russian authorities is an attempt to give credibility to the actions of high-level Russian officials involved in the expropriation, including direct orders of President Putin and a number of Russian cabinet ministers,” Pugachyov said in a statement.

Pugachyov, who denies any wrongdoing, was subject to an earlier red notice by Interpol which was canceled after he challenged it in court. He said he plans to explore “all avenues of canceling this second notice.”

Tuva

The former senator for the Republic of Tuva in southern Siberia, is subject to a $2 billion worldwide asset freezing order imposed by U.K. courts as a result if the fallout over the bank’s collapse.

The Russian Deposit Insurance Agency, the state entity liquidating the lender, has accused Pugachyov of embezzling more than $2 billion as the bank was teetering on the edge of collapse, lawyers for the DIA said in court documents. Pugachyov, who was once one of Russia’s richest men, was sued in London by the DIA because he has property in the country.

Pugachyov said he has been stripped of his assets and politically targeted since the bank went bankrupt in 2010 in a campaign that bears “all the hallmarks of the kind of illegal raiding that has become a notorious feature of Russian commercial life,” his lawyers said in documents filed at London’s High Court.

Interpol didn’t immediately respond to calls and e-mails seeking comment on Pugachyov’s listing.

To contact the reporter on this story: Jeremy Hodges in London at jhodges17@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Aarons at aaarons@bloomberg.net Peter Chapman