[PT] “Portuguese carry suitcases with money.” Navalny accuses Portugal of taking bribes for Abramovich’s naturalization
[PT] “Portuguese carry suitcases with money.” Navalny accuses Portugal of taking bribes for Abramovich’s naturalization
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>Alexei Navalny accuses Portugal of receiving bribes to make Roman Abramovich a Portuguese citizen. The Russian oligarch who owns Chelsea was naturalized under the Nationality Law as a Sephardic Jew last April.
>The critical revelation by the political opponent of Vladimir Puin, who is serving a two-and-a-half-year prison sentence east of Moscow, was made on Twitter in mid-December. Alexei Navalny does not spare accusations to Portugal for having granted naturalization to his compatriot, claiming that Abramovich has seen his Sephardic ancestry proven by the Sephardic Certification Commission of the Portuguese Jewish community, “which has been a partner in recent years.
>According to Público, this certification was essential to the process, which was submitted to the Central Records Office in Lisbon and the Ministry of Justice on October 16, 2020, and was concluded on April 30.
>According to Navalny, Abramovich is “Putin’s closest oligarch and one of his wallets.” “Finally [Abramovich] managed to find a country where he can pay some bribes and make some semi-official and official payments to end up in the European Union and NATO,” the Kremlin critic wrote in a post on the social network Twitter.
>Navalny also points out that Abramovich bought a Boeing 787 plane worth $350 million as a New Year’s gift to himself. “Putin and Abramovich steal from [Russia’s] budget and invest money in the West,” he claims.
>”The West is frightened by Putin’s attack on Ukraine, but gives citizenship to its trusted oligarch,” criticizes the Russian oppositionist, who stresses that “Portuguese officials carry suitcases with money.”
>Navalny, a poisoning victim in August 2020, also points the finger at television presenters who praise Putin for his fight against NATO, “in a perfect cycle of hypocrisy and corruption.”
>”And only the sad citizen of Russia, who paid for all this, stays in the store and assesses whether he has enough money to buy a bottle of vodka and three tangerines for the New Year,” Navalny further commented, quoted by Público.
Translated with http://www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Be right back, got to go walk my suitcase filled with money.
The fact that Portugal also distributes “Golden Passports” to rather dubious rich people in exchange for “investments” is not new. Everyone in the EU knows this, as do Cyprus and Malta, for example.
“This is a lucrative scheme started by several countries as a relatively easy way to attract foreign money after the 2008 financial crisis but criticized by many for attracting criminals and money laundering to the EU.
It is believed that Portugal has so far issued golden visas to more than 25,000 people, earning more than €5.5 billion, with Henley Partners as the agency mandated by the Portuguese government to handle passport applications.”
https://www.eureporter.co/world/portugal/2021/06/07/portugals-golden-passports/
The Portuguese Jewish commission is clearly above any suspicion.
Who doesn’t have in his pocket proofs of his own medieval ancestors?
Where’s the surprise? The golden visas business is Portuguese corruption made official.
Is he trying to disrespect the Portuguese people themselves, or is he saying that certain Portuguese power brokers may have had, ahem, impure motivations for accepting Abramovich? If its the latter, I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss him.
However, if he is just making broad sweeping generalizations about entire groups of European people, then he might as well just go and be friends with Putin after all.