Well, yes, because the way he got rich was stealing Russian public assets, then bribing public officials in Russia to legalise his theft and then using that to buy legitimate assets in the UK AND WE KNEW THE SOURCE OF THE MONEY AND TOLD HIM IT WAS OK - ThreadSky

theangelofhistory.bsky.social • 1 day ago

Well, yes, because the way he got rich was stealing Russian public assets, then bribing public officials in Russia to legalise his theft and then using that to buy legitimate assets in the UK AND WE KNEW THE SOURCE OF THE MONEY AND TOLD HIM IT WAS OK

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ovakiv.bsky.social•1 day ago

In n 1994 my mom as a translator accompanied a wealthy Ukrainian couple on a trip from Worthing to London with a specific purpose of them opening a current bank account in the UK. The couple were just visiting the country on a tourist visa. The account was opened without a hitch.

ovakiv.bsky.social•1 day ago

No such thing would be possible today or even 10 years after the event. If the couple maintained that account open, I imagine the bank at some point had to refresh KYC/AML checks on them. By the logic of your argument, it should never had attained a right to do so, it would be fundamentally unfair.

theangelofhistory.bsky.social•1 day ago

I don’t think the events of the last 30 years really support the claim that it was a bad thing that KYC/AML checks were introduced 20 years ago…it’s very revealing that the UK only finally got around to a meaningful qualitative assessment on AML (instead of just “racial profiling”) in 2022.

theangelofhistory.bsky.social•1 day ago

(But back to the point, the situation is legally tricky because what we want is to retrospectively undo the corruption of the previous years, because - surprise surprise - turns out Putin is bad - but we had ourselves legalised that past corruption)

ovakiv.bsky.social•1 day ago

100% with you on this and the previ post. But the OP had the undertones of "is this really a fair thing to do to a legitimate businessman"? I am obviously biased but bringing up human rights as a relevant question in this situation is like debating the merits of pacifism with a frontline soldier.

theangelofhistory.bsky.social•1 day ago

The law is the law and the UK is not in a state of war (even assuming you supported martial law in states of war). If you want us to break our own laws to help Ukraine, the simple answer is “fuck off”. If you want help from a liberal democracy, that will involve allowing legal process to work thru.

theangelofhistory.bsky.social•1 day ago

Also on why people didn’t want to believe Putin is bad…some people saw levelling Grozny as an inspiration not a warning….

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-27122008.amp

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