Vladimir Stefanovich Litvinenko (russian: Влади́мир Стефа́нович Литвине́нко, born 14 August 1955) is a Russian academic, businessman and
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who holds the office of president of Russia. Putin has served continuously as president or prime minister since 1999: as prime min ...
's campaign manager.
He is also rector of
Saint Petersburg Mining University
Saint Petersburg Mining University (russian: Санкт-Петербургский горный университет), is Russia's oldest technical university, and one of the oldest technical colleges in Europe. It was founded on October 21, ...
in
St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
.
Career
Litvinenko has been the rector of Saint Petersburg Mining University since the 1990s.
He oversaw Vladimir Putin's dissertation work in 1996, which is alleged to include significant amounts of
plagiarism
Plagiarism is the fraudulent representation of another person's language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions as one's own original work.From the 1995 '' Random House Compact Unabridged Dictionary'': use or close imitation of the language and thought ...
and is speculated perhaps to have not even been written by Putin. Litvinenko has been criticised for either not spotting the alleged plagiarism or blatantly ignoring it.
[ Clifford Gaddy: "Mr. Litvinenko -- who was directly involved in the dissertation, allegedly helped ]utin Utin may refer to:
* Utin (castle), a former Wendish castle in north Germany
* Saint-Utin, a commune in north-eastern France
* Ikouwem Udo
Ikouwem Udo Utin (born 11 November 1999) is a Nigerian international footballer who plays for Croatian c ...
choose the topic and was more or less the advisor for the dissertation -- is himself a member of the higher accreditation commission, which is the government-appointed body to be the watchdog over standards about degree-granting, dissertations and quality control for higher education in Russia. So it’s extra scandalous that he would be involved in this case of, at minimum, shoddiness and plagiarism, possibly something worse, which would be the literal purchase, either by money or political influence, of a dissertation by someone who didn’t actually do the work. That second point is not clear. I don’t have proof about that. All I have is proof about the plagiarism." According to his daughter Olga, Vladimir Litvinenko himself wrote the dissertation.
Litvinenko was Putin's political campaign manager in 2000 and 2004.
On June 11, 2014, he was given an honorary doctorate by the
Freiberg University of Mining and Technology
The Technische Universität Bergakademie Freiberg (abbreviation: TU Bergakademie Freiberg, TUBAF) is a public university of technology with currently 3655 students in the city of Freiberg, Saxony, Germany. Its focus is on exploration, mining & ...
, Saxony, Germany.
In 2022, he signed the
Address of the Russian Union of Rectors, which called to support
Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who holds the office of president of Russia. Putin has served continuously as president or prime minister since 1999: as prime min ...
in his
invasion of Ukraine
The territory of present-day Ukraine has been Invasion, invaded or Military occupation, occupied a number of times throughout History of Ukraine, its history.
List
See also
*List of invasions
*List of wars involving Ukraine
References
...
.
Business career
Litvinenko owns nearly 15% of
PhosAgro, a
phosphate
In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid .
The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phospho ...
mining company
in the Arctic.
The mine had been at one time partly owned by
Mikhail Khodorkovsky
Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky (russian: link=no, Михаил Борисович Ходорковский, ; born 26 June 1963), sometimes known by his initials MBK, is an exiled Russian businessman and opposition activist, now residing in L ...
.
He claims that he was paid in shares for some consulting that he did in 2004 and that this "did not contradict any laws".
Phosagro was floated on the
London Stock Exchange
London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...
in July 2011 and Litvinenko was listed among its new owners, as chairman.
When Litvinenko owned 5%, the stock was worth about $260 million.
In April 2014, he acquired a further 4.9% from
Andrey Guryev, who controls the company, for $269 million.
Personal life
Litvinenko is married to Tatyana Petrovna Klovanich. Litvinenko has a daughter,
Olga, born in 1983,
who used to be a member of the
Legislative Assembly of Saint Petersburg
The Legislative Assembly of Saint Petersburg (russian: Законода́тельное собра́ние Санкт-Петербу́рга, ЗакС) is the regional parliament of Saint Petersburg, a federal subject (federal city) of Russia ...
.
In May 2010 Vladimir and his wife Tatyana were looking after Olga's daughter
Ester-Maria Litvinenko (born in 2009), and refused to give her back to Olga.
Olga has described this as a
kidnapping
In criminal law, kidnapping is the unlawful confinement of a person against their will, often including transportation/asportation. The asportation and abduction element is typically but not necessarily conducted by means of force or fear: the p ...
and has instigated legal proceedings to get her daughter back. Olga describes her father as "the richest rector in Russia" and an "
oligarch" ("самый богатый ректор России, олигарх"
). When Olga fled the country in summer 2011, Vladimir reported to the police that Olga and her other son, Michael Stefan, had been kidnapped and his daughter's assets were frozen.
According to Olga, all lawyers defending her were arrested and sentenced.
Litvinenko: Putin wants to show Europe that Russia's law applies everywhere
telewizjarepublika.pl, November 5th 2014
References
External links
Profile of Litvinenko
Saint Petersburg Times
Olga's Daughter Facebook
in Russian
{{DEFAULTSORT:Litvinenko, Vladimir
1955 births
Living people
People from Timashyovsky District
Recipients of the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland", 3rd class
Recipients of the Order of Honour (Russia)
Russian billionaires
Businesspeople in real estate
Saint Petersburg Mining University faculty
Saint Petersburg Mining University alumni
State Prize of the Russian Federation laureates