Sergey Viktorovich Chemezov (; born 20 August 1952) is a Russian oligarch and politician who served as

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

of Rostec Corporation, a state-owned defense conglomerate. A former KGB agent and high-ranking general, Chemezov befriended

Vladimir Putin Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who has served as President of Russia since 2012, having previously served from 2000 to 2008. Putin also served as Prime Minister of Ru ...

when both were stationed in East Germany in the 1980s. In 2007, Putin appointed him as CEO of Rostec. The

Pandora Papers The Pandora Papers are 11.9 million leaked documents with 2.9 terabytes of data that the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) published beginning on 3 October 2021. The leak exposed the secret offshore accounts of 35 ...

leaks revealed that Chemezov and his family maintained a large network of offshore wealth, including a $600 million superyacht.

Biography

Chemezov was born on 20 August 1952 in the city of Cheremkhovo in

Irkutsk Oblast Irkutsk Oblast (; ) is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Russia (an oblast), located in southeastern Siberia in the basins of the Angara River, Angara, Lena River, Lena, and Nizhnyaya Tunguska Rivers. The administrative center is ...

. Chemezov graduated with honours from Irkutsk Institute of National Economy (presently Baikal State University of Economics and Law) in 1975 and then completed his postgraduate education at the

Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia The Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation () is the senior staff college of the Russian Armed Forces. The academy is located in Moscow, on 14 Kholzunova Lane. It was founded in 1936 as a Soviet inst ...

. Chemezov has a doctorate in economics and is also a professor and full member of the Military Academy. At the Irkutsk Scientific and Research Institute of Rare and Nonferrous Metals, Chemezov provided economic assessment of deposits as an engineer, a research associate, and chief laboratory assistant for six months from 15 October 1975 to 28 April 1976 while he was waiting for his paperwork to process to enter the ranks of the

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

East Germany and Putin

From 1980 to 1988 as KGB, he worked at "Luch" Research-Industrial Association which was the KGB surveillance operation gathering

scientific and technical intelligence Technical intelligence (TECHINT) is intelligence about weapons and equipment used by the armed forces of foreign nations. The related term, scientific and technical intelligence, addresses information collected or analyzed about the broad range ...

in the communist controlled German Democratic Republic (GDR). From 1983 to 1988, Chemezov served as the head of the Luch Association representative office in

East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

, where he met

and

Nikolay Tokarev Nikolay Petrovich Tokarev (; born 20 December 1950) is a Russian businessman and oligarch. He is the president of the Russian pipeline company Transneft. Early life and KGB In 1973, Tokarev graduated from Karaganda Polytechnic Institute (KarP ...

. Tokarev, Chemezov and Putin worked for their

boss Lazar Matveev while in East Germany and both Chemezov and Putin lived in the same block of flats in

Dresden Dresden (; ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; , ) is the capital city of the States of Germany, German state of Saxony and its second most populous city after Leipzig. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, 12th most p ...

. There they became friends. According to their colleague and former KGB officer Vladimir Gortanov (also known as Usoltsev) (), Chemezov worked in Directorate K, which is counterintelligence, and attempted to recruit KGB operatives from West Germany's counterintelligence community especially the West German military counterintelligence or at least from the West German criminal police. From 1988 to 1996, Chemezov, as the KGB controller with the 3rd department of the 11th department of the 5th department of the KGB, was deputy CEO of the "Sovintersport" Foreign Trade Association under the leadership of Viktor Galaev (). Sovintersport, which held a monopoly on Soviet sports with the West, is a portmanteau of Soviet, International, Export, and Sport formed by Putin and Chemezov.

Kremlin aide to Putin

From 1996 to 1999, he was chairman of the Department for Foreign Economic Relations within the Office for Presidential Affairs, serving under Putin. Later he transitioned to the position of chairman of the Department for Foreign Economic Relations of the

Presidential Administration of Russia The Presidential Executive Office, Russia ( PEO, Russia) or the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation (; АП РФ, ''AP RF''), or PARF, is the executive office of the president of Russia created by a decree of Boris Yeltsin on ...

. During this time and although both Ukraine and Georgia objected, Chemezov was pivotal in securing for Russia, Russia's correct share from the former USSR's state property, state archives and state debts.

Head of Promexport and Rosoboronexport

From September 1999 to November 2000, Chemezov served as CEO of Promexport. In August 2000, he became a member of the Presidential Committee on Military and Engineering Cooperation between Russia and Foreign Countries. From November 2000 to April 2004, Chemezov served as first deputy CEO of

Rosoboronexport JSC Rosoboronexport (ROE; , ''Rosoboroneksport'') is the sole state intermediary agency for Russia's exports/imports of defense-related and dual use products, technologies and services. The Rosoboronexport Federal State Unitary Enterprise (FSU ...

and then as its CEO from 2004 to 2007. After Rosoboronexport obtained an 66% stake in

VSMPO-Avisma VSMPO-AVISMA Corporation () is the world's largest titanium producer. Located in Verkhnyaya Salda, Russia, VSMPO-AVISMA also operates facilities in Ukraine, England, Switzerland, Germany, United States. The company produces titanium, aluminum, m ...

in October 2006, Sergey Chemezov became chairman of VSMPO-AVISMA in November 2006.

CEO of Rostec

On 26 November 2007, Putin appointed by decree Chemezov as CEO of Russian Technologies Corporation, which was renamed

Rostec Rostec, formally trading as State Corporation "Rostec", fully the State Corporation for the Promotion of the Development, Manufacture, and Export of High Tech Products "Rostec" and formerly Rostekhnologii, is a Russian State corporation (Russia), ...

in late 2012. He is credited with the consolidation of hundreds of

state-owned enterprises A state-owned enterprise (SOE) is a business entity created or owned by a national or local government, either through an executive order or legislation. SOEs aim to generate profit for the government, prevent private sector monopolies, provide goo ...

that were made his responsibility as the fruit of government decree. In the decade after his appearance, the total volume of exports doubled to just under $14 billion. At the 6th

United Russia The All-Russian Political Party United Russia (, ) is the Ruling party, ruling List of political parties in Russia, political party of Russia. As the largest party in the Russian Federation, it holds 325 (or 72.22%) of the 450 seats in the St ...

party convention held on 2 December 2006, Chemezov was elected to the party's Supreme Council. At the 7th party convention on 26 May 2012, Chemezov was reelected.

Sanctions

On 28 April 2014, he was barred by the

Obama administration Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. Obama, a Democrat from Illinois, took office following his victory over Republican nomine ...

from entering the United States due to the

annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation In February and March 2014, Russia invaded the Crimea, Crimean Peninsula, part of Ukraine, and then annexed it. This took place in the relative power vacuum immediately following the Revolution of Dignity. It marked the beginning of the Russ ...

. He was sanctioned by the UK government in 2014 in relation to the

Russo-Ukrainian War The Russo-Ukrainian War began in February 2014 and is ongoing. Following Ukraine's Revolution of Dignity, Russia Russian occupation of Crimea, occupied and Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, annexed Crimea from Ukraine. It then ...

. On 12 September 2014 as part of a much wider expansion of its programme, Chemezov was sanctioned by the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...

over the war in Ukraine. The same day, Chemerov was mentioned in a communiqué of the US Treasury because the firm he directs was subjected to sanctions as part of a sweeping ban on the Russian defence sector. The joint September 2014 sanctions packages had been agreed in principle at the

2014 NATO Wales summit The 2014 Wales Summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was the 25th summit of the heads of state and heads of government of the NATO countries, held in Newport, Wales on 4 and 5 September 2014. Such Summit (meeting), summits are ...

. Through Serguei Adoniev's charitable contributions, Chemezov had become an influence in the

Novaya Gazeta ''Novaya Gazeta'' (, ) is an independent Russian newspaper. It is known for its critical and investigative coverage of Russian political and social affairs, the Chechen wars, corruption among the ruling elite, and increasing authoritarianism i ...

press since 2014. In February 2019, the

Alexei Navalny Alexei Anatolyevich Navalny (, ; 4 June 197616 February 2024) was a Russian Opposition to Vladimir Putin in Russia, opposition leader, anti-corruption in Russia, corruption activist and political prisoner. He founded the Anti-Corruption Found ...

linked

Anti-Corruption Foundation The Anti-Corruption Foundation (ACF or FBK; ; ) is a non-profit organization established in 2011 by the Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny. The FBK published investigations into alleged corruption by high-ranking Russian government official ...

discovered Chemezov's wife's Ekaterina Ignatova's apartment in the building located at the former site of the Moskva Hotel with a market value of about 5 billion rubles. On 3 March 2022, the United States imposed visa restrictions and froze assets of Chemezov, his wife, sons, stepdaughter due to the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

. On 15 March 2022, Spain temporarily seized Chemezov's $140m yacht 'Valerie' in Barcelona because of the

Offices

Chemezov has served as a member of the Board of Directors for: * United Aircraft Corporation JSC (since 2006) * United Shipbuilding Corporation JSC (since 2007) * Rusnano Corporation (since 2011) *

MMC Norilsk Nickel Norilsk Nickel (), or Nornickel, is a Russian nickel and palladium mining and smelting company. Its largest operations are located in the Norilsk–Talnakh area near the Yenisei River in the north of Siberia. It also has holdings in Nikel, Zapol ...

(March 2013) * Aeroflot Russian Airlines (since 2011) * Rosneft JSC (as Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors since June 2013) Chemezov has served as chairman of the Board of Directors for: * United Industrial Corporation Oboronprom *

VSMPO-AVISMA VSMPO-AVISMA Corporation () is the world's largest titanium producer. Located in Verkhnyaya Salda, Russia, VSMPO-AVISMA also operates facilities in Ukraine, England, Switzerland, Germany, United States. The company produces titanium, aluminum, m ...

(since 2006) * ОАО «KAMAZ» *

AvtoVAZ AvtoVAZ ( rus, АвтоВАЗ, p=ɐftɐˈvas) is a Russian automobile manufacturing company owned by the state. It was formerly named as VAZ (), an acronym for Volga Automotive Plant in Russian (). AvtoVAZ is best known for its flagship series of ...

*Novikombank *National Information and Settlement Systems LLC (since 2012) *

(since 2011; in August 2013 Chemezov was reelected for a third time)

Academic activity, social activism and patronage

*Head of the Department of Military and Engineering Cooperation for the Scientific, Research and Educational Center of the Military Academy *Head of the Department of Military and Engineering Cooperation and High-Tech at MGIMO *Chairman of the Union of Mechanical Engineers, a public organization (since April 2007) *President of the Russian Industrial Association of Employers in Mechanical Engineering (since April 2007) *Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Kalashikov Military and Sport Association, an interregional public organization (since April 2010) *Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Foundation for the Support and Development of Physical Culture and Sport in the Russian Federation (Sport Foundation) (since 2005) *Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Russian Cycling Federation (since 2007) *Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Plekhanov Russian University of Economics *Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Gorchakov Public Diplomacy Foundation

Family

Chemezov married his first wife Lyuba when he was 18 years old. Chemezov is married to Yekaterina Ignatova, who is a trained planning engineer. She is a co-founder and seventy percent stockholder of Kate LLC, a company that develops and manufactures automatic gearboxes. Ignatova is also the majority shareholder (along with Gor Nahapetyan, the managing director of

Troika Dialog Sberbank CIB is a multinational investment banking and asset management firm headquartered in Moscow, Russia, and a subsidiary of Sberbank. It was founded in Moscow in 1991, and was formerly known as Troika Dialog. Sberbank CIB's core lines of ...

) of Étage, a chain of nineteen restaurants in Moscow. She has an apartment at 28 on

Povarskaya Street Povarskaya Street (, known from 1924–1991 as ''Vorovsky Street'' (улица Воровского), is a radial street in the center of Moscow, Russia, connecting Arbat Square on Boulevard Ring with Kudrinskaya Square on the Garden Ring. It ...

() in Moscow. Chemezov has four children. He is a thirty percent shareholder of Medfarmtekhologia, a member of the board of directors of AvtoVAZEnergo, and chairman of the board of directors of Interbusinessgroup, which holds via structural companies such commercial organizations as Independent Insurance Group LLC, Oborontsement JSC, and Oborontsement-energo LLC. Since 2003, Stanislav Chemezov has been the co-owner (together with Vladimir Artyakov's son, Dmitri) of the Meridian hotel facilities in Gelendzhik. Stanislav Chemezov is the only founder of Interbusinessgroup LLC () which has the shares in several construction companies, Russian Industrial Nanotechnologies (), I.A.D. business industry () and shares in Natural and Organic Products LLC () which is one of several companies clustered around Andrey Dolzhich's () Virgin Islands firm ''Natural and Organic Products, Inc'' that sells soil improvers to Persian Gulf countries including the soil near

Bahrain Bahrain, officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, is an island country in West Asia. Situated on the Persian Gulf, it comprises a small archipelago of 50 natural islands and an additional 33 artificial islands, centered on Bahrain Island, which mak ...

's Royal Palace which now have palm trees growing in soil improvers from Dolzhich's firm. According to other information accessed in May 2009, Chemezov's second son was studying in a medical institute. His youngest son Sergey was in primary school and his daughter was a graduate student at

MGIMO University Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) (, also known as MGIMO University) is an institute of higher education located in Moscow, Russia. The institute is run by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. MGIMO offers educati ...

Awards

* Order For Merit to the Fatherland of the 2nd class (2012) * Order For Merit to the Fatherland of the 3rd class (20 August 2007) for military and engineering cooperation with foreign countries * Order For Merit to the Fatherland of the 4th class *

Order of Friendship The Order of Friendship (, ') is a state decoration of the Russian Federation established by Boris Yeltsin by presidential decree 442 of 2 March 1994 to reward Russian and foreign nationals whose work, deeds and efforts have been aimed at ...

(2009) *

National Order of the Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and civil. Currently consisting of five classes, it was ...

(France, March 2010) for contributing to the cooperation between France and Russia in high-tech manufacturing * Order of Saint Righteous Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy (Russian Orthodox Church) *

Order of Holy Prince Daniel of Moscow The Order of Holy Prince Daniel of Moscow () is an award of the Russian Orthodox Church, established in 1988. There are three classes. History The Order was created by the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, Pimen I, and the Holy Synod of 28 ...

(Russian Orthodox Church) *Order of Saint Seraphim of Sarov of the 2nd class (Russian Orthodox Church) *Russian Government Award in science and engineering for 2004 *

Person of the Year __NOTOC__ Person of the Year, Man of the Year or Woman of the Year is an award given to an individual by any type of organization. Most often, it is given by a newspaper or other news outlet to annually recognize a public figure. Such awards hav ...

in 2004 in the area of Defense Industry Complex *Leader of the Russian Economy in 2004, awarded by the International Forum "World Experience and Russian Economy" *Suvorov Prize awarded by the Military Academy *On 21 April 2011, Chemezov was granted the status of an Honoured Resident of the city of Irkutsk for prominent achievements in the area of social, economic and cultural development of the city of Irkutsk

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chemezov, Sergey 1952 births Living people People from Cheremkhovo KGB officers Russian businesspeople Russian politicians Full Cavaliers of the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland" Recipients of the Order of Honour (Russia) Knights of the Legion of Honour Rostec Heroes of the Russian Federation Russian individuals subject to United Kingdom sanctions Russian individuals subject to U.S. Department of the Treasury sanctions Russian individuals subject to European Union sanctions