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Bloomberg: Putin’s war means Russia’s rich are no longer welcome in Davos

The rich and powerful who will flock to Davos this year will not have to endure the icy winter wind once and for all, but the icy climate towards Russia, whose oligarchs have hosted some of the most famous glamorous parties at the World Economic Forum, will is noticeable, reports Bloomberg.

The first live meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in the Swiss Alps in two years starts on Sunday after a Covid-related holiday. Even this meeting was delayed from the usual schedule at the end of January, which means that the snow is limited to the peaks for the first time.

The forum is different in other ways as well. Above the panels, speeches and dinners hang the reality of a war raging hundreds of miles to the east. President Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine marked an abrupt end to decades of Russian presence and influence in Davos.

There will likely be a more subdued tone as a whole, with the WEF being monitored by a group of Ukrainian officials trying to keep the world focused on their situation with the war in its third month. The keynote speech (via video conference) will be delivered by President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

It will be the first WEF in Switzerland since the fall of communism without a single Russian official or businessman. Russian companies have been excluded from the strategic partners, a group of international companies that play a prominent role in the calendar of events costing 600,000 Swiss francs ($ 615,000) per year. Russia House – known for its iced vodka – will not even be installed.

This is far from the height of Moscow’s generosity in Davos, when Russian-sponsored vodka and caviar parties were notorious for hosting large groups of young women without accreditation who claimed to be translators.

Putin’s war has seen unprecedented sanctions imposed on Russia by its political leadership to its oligarchs and major corporations. International companies withdrew en masse from the country. Trade and investment from Europe and the US with Russia have waned.

Sanctions give Putin more time to be provocative at the moment

Sanctioned billionaires are seeking safe haven in various parts of the world, sending their huge yachts to jump from one port to another to stay ahead of the law. Suddenly, anything “Russian” is considered taboo.

The WEF is no exception. At the last meeting in Davos in 2020, the Russian tycoons were the third best represented by the number of billionaires. But their future in Davos began to crumble just three days after Moscow’s attack on Ukraine, when WEF founder Klaus Schwab and President Borge Brende issued a statement condemning “Russia’s attack on Ukraine, the attacks and the atrocities “.

This is in stark contrast to Russia’s response to Putin’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. Although Russia’s official presence in Davos has declined, its billionaires and businessmen have not downgraded their profile.

Clinging to the Alps to enjoy Switzerland’s long-standing policy of neutrality in 2015, VTB President and CEO Andrey Kostin said: “We have friends here. Ukrainian friends, European friends, American friends.”

While some business relationships have been hit by sanctions, “this does not affect personal relationships,” said Kostin, a frequent participant in Davos.

That year VTB hosted an evening at the InterContinental Ski Resort, where guests were greeted by women in conical, gold uniforms with stripes of neon-LED lights wrapped around them. Caviar was served and the party guests sang along with guitarist Al Di Meola, Russian drummer Leonid Agutin, as well as Emir Kusturica & The No Smoking Orchestra.

Although the party did not go far beyond the events hosted by metal tycoon Oleg Deripaska over the years (one of which was based on a Russian wooden house), it attracted a large crowd, including Schwab. While usually avoiding private events, he said at the time that he had attended to show “our Russian friends that they are welcome in Davos” and that “in the end, Russia is a very important European country”.

WEF has played an important role in Russia’s post-communist history.

The conference established its reputation as an important event for the Russian elite in 1996, when several tycoons agreed to pool their media and financial resources to support Boris Yeltsin’s faltering re-election campaign in what became known as “Pact of Davos”.

The Russian delegation has grown in size and visibility for almost two decades, attracting big names such as then-President Dmitry Medvedev and, in 2009, Putin during his tenure as prime minister.

In 2011, a Russian investment bank staged what it called a “spectacular ice show” by skating stars.

In 2018, Russia threatened with a boycott after the US sanctions imposed on businessmen Viktor Vekselberg, Deripaska and Kostin. The Kremlin said organizers had withdrawn from a plan to ban them.

Putin addressed the nude virtual forum of the Covid era last year, paralleling current international tensions with the 1930s on the road to World War II. He used his speech to warn that the world is in danger of slipping into an “all against all” conflict.

Now his attack on Ukraine has brought conflict to the borders of the European Union, killed untold thousands of people and seen millions flee their homes.

Some Russian tycoons have followed the Kremlin line, while others have sought to separate themselves from the president’s belligerence.

Deripaska, whose connections to Putin have put him on sanctions lists, called the war “insane” in late March. He warned that the fighting could continue for “several more years”.

That’s not going to be enough to get him back somewhere like Davos soon. Meanwhile, multiple mornings, panels and evening events with Ukrainian officials have been closed.

As for Russia House, the plan is to change its name. The Victor Pinchuk Foundation, a charity named after its tycoon sponsor, plans to turn the site into a “Russian War Crimes House,” including a report on war crimes allegedly committed by Russian troops in Ukraine. .

Source: Capital

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