One rule for the rich, one for the aparatchiks

[The Beard]

A certain Russian airline is in the process of taking 14 Boeing 767s and 40 Airbuses. They are all leased, allegedly, and none of them are registered in Russia. They are all registered in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda. This is because the leasing companies are based there. The aircraft will have to be paid for in $U.S. not Russian Roubles. The boards of these companies are, allegedly, manned, apart from the odd local by Russians. So a Russian state airline pays millions of dollars a year to companies based in the Caribbean owned, allegedly, by Russians. The Russian government must know about this,
yet these people are all alive or at least still at liberty. There is a suspicion that, allegedly, Russian leaders are taking a cut. Nice to see Gorbachev's dream of reform is coming to fruition.

 

[volxstu]

A certain Russian airline is in the process of taking 14 Boeing 767s and 40 Airbuses. They are all leased, allegedly, and none of them are registered in Russia. They are all registered in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda. This is because the leasing companies are based there. The aircraft will have to be paid for in .S. not Russian Roubles. The boards of these companies are, allegedly, manned, apart from the odd local by Russians. So a Russian state airline pays millions of dollars a year to companies based in the Caribbean owned, allegedly, by Russians. The Russian government must know about this,
yet these people are all alive or at least still at liberty. There is a suspicion that, allegedly, Russian leaders are taking a cut. Nice to see Gorbachev's dream of reform is coming to fruition.

It never will do lets face it the Russians need comunism and they know that now just do a search for russian football hooligans. There is so much agression over there due to things not being all that much better if not worse than their communist lives.

 

[The Beard]

A mate of mine works in the Ukraine, he spends 3 months at a time there. Although things are changing, it seems that if a town needed a new block of flats, the town planners would approve it, but when the building needed signing off by the local building inspector, it used to be quite usual that in exchange for a backhander, sub-standard work would be approved. Surplus building materials would be syphoned off for private work for people who got fed up with waiting for the local government to get its finger out and approve their applications for building. That was the Soviet way. But this is something in an entirely different league. It helps me unerstand how the likes of Abramovich have made their money. Let's not forget that up until the break up of the Soviet Union, and perhaps even now, in Moscow there were more official cars for Communist party officials than buses for the general population.

 

[jug]

what's the problem exactly?

 

[The Beard]

what's the problem exactly?

Just a topic for conversation. If it's a little too advanced for you I'll understand.

 

[jug]

Just a topic for conversation. If it's a little too advanced for you I'll understand.