Russian businessman Arkady Rotenberg said Saturday that he owns a palace in southern Russia that Kremlin prisoner Alexei Navalny has linked to Vladimir Putin.
Navalny and his anti-corruption base have released a video in which they claim that the opulent mansion belongs to the Russian president. The video has been viewed over 103m times.
Rotenberg, the judo sputum partner Putin that sold its interest in gas pipeline construction company Stroygazmontazh in 2019 for a sum that RBC business puts in every day at some 75bn rubles (£ 72m), said he bought the palace two years ago.
“Now it will no longer be a mystery, I am the winner,” Rotenberg said in a video published by the Mash channel in Telegram. “It was a rather complicated facility, there were a lot of creditors, and I managed to be a beneficiary.”
He did not provide further financial details about the purchase or how it was funded.
Putin has refused to take possession of the palace.
Navalny was detained for 30 days on Jan. 18 for parole violations he says were sank. He could spend years in prison. He was arrested after returning to Moscow from Germany, where he had undergone zero agent poisoning in August last year.
Following the arrest of Navalny, thousands of people engaged in uncontrolled protests across Russia last Saturday to demand the release of the Kremlin from prison.
His supporters plan to hold more protests across Russia on Sunday. Authorities have declared the rallies illegal and have promised to break them up.
Rotenberg was among Russian business officials and officials who were blacklisted by the U.S. and other western states after Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014.
Russian police on Saturday arrested Sergey Smirnov, Mediazona’s top external editor in the independent media, in Moscow on suspicion of involvement in the Moscow protest last weekend, Mediazona said on Saturday.