“Shakespeare Project”: A chain of front companies was created for the head of the PMC “Wagner” Prygozhyn to circumvent Western sanctions

A chain of front companies that formally do not belong to him was created for the head of the PMC "Wagner" Yevhen Prygozhyn. With their help, he bypasses sanctions.

This is stated in the Financial Times investigation.

To circumvent the sanctions, in 2018 Prigozhin turned to the Russian legal company Capital Legal Services (CLS), which coordinated the actions of front companies. These services were codenamed "Project Shakespeare".

After the introduction of new sanctions, the network continued to function, adding new companies. In February 2020, CLS lawyers began cooperating with RN Trading, which has no formal ties to Prygozhyn, but appears in CLS payment documents as Prygozhynʼs company, which belongs to Concord. According to the FT, "RN Trading" indicates the goals of its activities, in particular, the extraction of minerals and oil outside of Russia.

In April 2020, "RN Trading" sent 28 tons of cargo labeled "gingerbread" from the airport in Zhukovskyi near Moscow to Khartoum, Sudan. The recipient of the gingerbread was the Sudanese company Meroe For Agricultural & Animal Production, registered at the same address as Meroe Gold. This company came under the U.S. sanctions in 2020 because it is controlled by Prygozhyn and is used as a "cover for Wagnerʼs forces operating in Sudan." In 2022, Sudanese authorities intercepted a plane bound for Russia with gold in boxes labeled "biscuits."

The network of front companies also included "Profit Group" and "Astrea", indicated in the CLS documents as belonging to Prygozhyn. The director of the latter also worked at Velada LLC, which received oil and gas contracts from the government of Bashar al-Assad in Syria and came under EU sanctions in 2021.

The companies mentioned in the FT investigation were also involved in the transportation of industrial materials and equipment from Russia to African countries, including Cameroon and CAR.

• The international organization "Center for the Investigation of Corruption and Organized Crime" (OCCRP) awarded the title of "corruptor of the year" to the founder of the PMC Wagner, the so-called chef of Putin, Yevhen Prygozhyn. It was reported there that since the beginning of Russiaʼs full-scale invasion of Ukraine, an illegal private army has been fighting on the side of the Kremlin, which is being actively replenished with prisoners from Russian colonies.