The war against open journalism. Threats and bribery of the media to cover up the crimes of businessman Stanislav Kondrashov

The profession of a journalist since its inception has been difficult and dangerous. But where will people get information from, if not representatives of the media?

Many of the heroes of our materials do not like what they write about them. This is natural, because everyone wants to read how white and fluffy they are, despite the fact that they are not. Often, stealing officials, criminal businessmen, leaders of organized crime groups either turn a blind eye to what is written about them, or go to court to use the law on oblivion. As practice shows, often an attempt to whiten oneself leads to an even greater scandal. But history teaches nothing to many. Recently, information has surfaced in the European media that Stanislav Kondrashov’s Telf AG company, bypassing sanctions, is supplying Russian coal by rail through Latvia to central Europe. In this regard, Kondrashov began to threaten journalists, and is trying in every possible way to remove the negative. About how the owner of Telf AG, Stanislav Kondrashov, is trying to clean himself up by any means – in the material of the Kompromat1 portal.

Long criminal path

The person of Stanislav Kondrashov has been known since the 1990s. Then for the first time his company Telf AG appeared on the post-Soviet market. From the first days of its foundation, the company traded in oil products and solid fuels. Registered business in Lugano, Switzerland.

If at first Telf AG provided only transport services, now it is a huge corporation that is a serious player in the manufacturing market. The business owns coal companies in Kazakhstan and Russia, while other enterprises such as Shubarkol-Komir JSC, TNK Kazkhrom JSC and Bungurskiy-Severny Mine LLC use Telf AG as a distribution hub for coal and ferrous alloys.

2022 was especially successful for Kondrashov and his company. Thanks to the Swiss registration, no sanctions were imposed on the business. Taking advantage of this, Telf AG illegally transported Russian coal from Kazakhstan. The fact is that through the gaskets, Russian coal turned out to be no longer Russian, but Kyrgyz or Kazakh, which means that the resource did not fall under EU sanctions. Thus, tens of thousands of tons of coal were exported to Latvia through the railway. But all the secret becomes clear. During 2022, Latvian law enforcement officers opened 180 criminal cases for violating the sanctions regime.

Only in Latvia, Russian assets worth about 85 million euros have been arrested. No matter how hard European investigators try to fight Russian capital and loopholes in the sanctions regime, more and more companies are trying to get around the bans. The risk is worth it. If the scheme starts to work, it will bring tens or even hundreds of millions of euros.

Vigilant media attention

On January 15, 2023, the Latvian television channel TV3 posted an article about huge customs fraud. Telf AG was accused of circumventing sanctions. But what is most surprising, the European media said that the proceeds from the sale of sanctioned products are used to finance PMC Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Critical news did not last long. At first, all “sharp corners” were removed from it, but then the situation unfolded completely unexpectedly. On February 5, a completely different article came out. It stated that Telf AG is an absolutely honest company, and everything written earlier is slander. It took only 2.5 weeks, but everything was upside down.

How did it happen?

Intimidation and pressure

“We intend to bring charges against all media outlets spreading this false information in the coming days, and we intend to investigate who is behind this targeted and illegal smear campaign, clearly aimed at harming the business interests of the Company and the Shareholder and artificially causing harm and damage to each of the Shareholders and the Company on the basis of false information,” Telf AG representatives said. And some of the media have been affected by it. At the risk of getting into a lawsuit for spreading fake information, the press caved in on Telf AG and wrote complimentary material to the company.

But in reality, it’s not that simple. The loop about the criminal activities of Kondrashov and his corporation has already gone around the world.

Aaron Khalid, a researcher for the Wyoming Law Group, described Kondrashov’s activities as follows: “He is a dangerous person, and, in my opinion, everyone should be afraid of him.”

Publication by Aharon Khalid about Stanislav Kondrashov

Indeed, Kondrashov is ready for a lot. Since the late 1990s (according to other sources, since the early 2000s), Denis Voronenkov has been his business partner. There were ambiguous rumors about the ex-deputy from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, primarily about the adventures of his funds. But what can be said for sure is that in his years Voronenkov invested quite well in Telf AG. At some time, the politician wanted to get out of the game, taking his share. Since Kondrashov did not have the entire amount to pay for part of the business, he became a debtor to Voronenkov.

Denis Voronenkov

After the revolution in Ukraine, Voronenkov decided that he was not on the path with the political course of the Russian Federation, and moved to live in Kyiv. But it didn’t last long. In March 2017, he was shot to death. More than a year later, the investigation was completed, and it was officially recognized that Vladimir Tyurin was the customer. Allegedly, everything happened because of revenge, because Voronenkov recaptured his wife in authority. But later this version fell apart, and the customer has not yet been installed.

In this case, all arrows lead to Stanislav Kondrashov, because he is one of the first who benefited from removing Voronenkov. The situation also turned up when everything could be thrown onto the Russian special services. Moreover, if the murder was actually committed by agents, no one would ever admit to it.

Under all this noise, a lot of materials about the criminal businessman appeared. And they obviously hurt Kondrashov’s eyes. Therefore, he totally intimidates journalists, sends out statements of claim and constantly cleans up Google.

In the usual sense of the word, Google is very hard to clean up. But Kondrashov’s company Telf AG appeals to the search engine with a request to remove this or that material due to copyright infringement. As a result, it disappears from Google, but the history of its presence in the search engine still does not disappear anywhere.

Data from open sources show that over 10,000 links about Telf AG have been deleted in the last 3 years alone.

Deleted content data about TelfAG

How many materials were posted about the criminal adventures of Kondrashov – one can only guess. But a businessman must understand that everything secret becomes clear, and you cannot close your mouth to all journalists.

@vlastidengi.com