Chasing Evgeny News Today

Second, the lebedevs, and particularly evgeny, were very proud of the work they raised, the money they raised for the gorbachev cancer foundation. they had gorbachev in the evening standard newsroom. putin despises gorbachev. he sees gorbachev as the man who helped collapse the soviet union, ending russia as a great power. so, i mean, its a strange thing to have that kind of close relationship with gorbachev. now third, i would draw a distinction between the father and the son. the son always st...

And end of a kgb agent. i think its very disputed whether there is such a thing as a former kgb agent, as you know, to quote vladimir putin himself, who once said in one of his famous press conferences, once a spy, always a spy, he said that to edward snowden. so whether or not thats the case, thats the father, not the son. were talking about the son right now. absolutely. but at the same time, what was happening with the independent at the same time, he had just taken over, and it was very clea...

You injust, you know, mr lebedev is now a peer sitting in the house of lords. sunday times this week alleged that he was deemed a security risk during the vetting process, but that boris johnson disagreed with this analysis. i think youve been trying to find out exactly what happened. thats right. so we know that, you know, really, just a few weeks within borisjohnson being elected prime minister in december 2019, he decided to make evgenya member of the house of lords. so it was his personal no...

Thats ukraine — "in the most public way possible." paul, ijust wanted to bring you in. mr lebedev is now a peer sitting in the house of lords. sunday times this week alleged that he was deemed a security risk during the vetting process, but that boris johnson disagreed with this analysis. i think youve been trying to find out exactly what happened. thats right. so we know that, really, just a few weeks within borisjohnson being elected prime minister in december 2019, he decided to make evgeny...

Not a household name by any means, i should say, seemed to have such a good — such good access to borisjohnson. paul caruana galizia, youve explored this question too for tortoise media. take us back to the beginning. i mean, in 2009, the russian businessman and former kgb agent alexander lebedev bought the london evening standard for £1. his son, evgeny, became the papers publisher. a year later, they bought the independent, also for £1. just tell us a bit about it all. so, we release the p...

Is that they turned to the security services for advice. it was only on march 17 that they finally got that advice, and they met to discuss it in a committee room in parliament, and were so disturbed by it, they immediately wrote to the prime minister, saying, "we feel deeply uncomfortable about this "nomination, about evgeny�*s nomination. "will you please reconsider "or would you consider an alternative?" which they proposed. and he did indeed end up becoming a peer. thats right, he became a...

To give him a peerage. second, the lebedevs, and particularly evgeny, were very proud of the work they raised, the money they raised for the raisa gorbachev cancer foundation. they had gorbachev in the evening standard newsroom. putin despises gorbachev. he sees gorbachev as the man who helped collapse the soviet union, ending russia as a great power. so, i mean, its a strange thing to have that kind of closer relationship with gorbachev. now, third, i would draw a distinction between the father...

So, in russia, alexander bought a large chunk of novaya gazeta with gorbachev, and he also bought a smaller tabloid. there is some irony in that — that tabloid, in 2008, reported allegations that putin was having an affair with a young gymnast, and within a few days, the tabloid was shutdown, and it was, really, within a couple of weeks of that that alexander and evgeny started the process to buy the evening standard. so when we reported on that deal, for us, it was also about the openness of ...

Underwhelming, i would say. he came across as a rich mans son. i didnt hang out with him. we had one meeting ahead of time. we didnt start off very well because he approached newsnight and it was very much part of his transformation of a party boy into a much more serious figure in the british public life. he approached newsnight with a suggestion for a collaboration and they called me up and asked if i wanted to do a collaboration with lebedev who had secured a incredible interview with europes...

A large chunk of novaya gazeta with gorbachev, and he also bought a smaller tabloid. there is some irony in that, that tabloid in 2008 reported allegations that putin was having an affair with a young gymnast. and within a few days, the tabloid was shut down. and it was really within a couple of weeks of that, alexander and evgeny started the process to buy the evening standard. so when we reported on that deal, for us, it was also about the openness of the british establishment in which we reco...