Over the past year we have witnessed an outlandish, one might even say medieval, ritual. One after another, the numerous daughters, sons, nephews and sons-in-law of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov have been promoted to high positions – they would head ministries and agencies of the Chechen government, receive various awards and other tokens of political attention. It was just like in the days of ancient kings – the offspring of a ruler receive titles not for merit, but by right of blood.

At first it seemed that the most favoured heir was Kadyrov’s eldest son Akhmat. He got married in early 2023 at the age of 17. This footage shows Kadyrov Jr’s wedding cortege, filmed by his guest, rapper Timati.

Timati himself can be seen riding in one of the many cars in this luxury motorcade. But the motorcades of Kadyrov – no matter which one – hardly come as a surprise any more. Much more surprising was the fact that at the same time young Akhmat Kadyrov was received in Moscow by Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin even preferred not to report on this event, but Ramzan Kadyrov himself boasted about his son’s meeting with Putin on Telegram. Why would Putin want to personally meet with a Chechen teenager, when even his own cabinet has long been communicating with him via video link?

In the autumn came the turn of Kadyrov’s third eldest son, the then 15-year-old Adam. This shocking seven-second video from 25 September shows Adam Kadyrov beating the detained Nikita Zhuravel right in the office of the Grozny pre-trial detention centre. The 19-year-old was detained in Volgograd in a case of offending the feelings of believers – he videotaped himself burning a Koran. Without the slightest legal grounds, the detainee was transferred to custody in Chechnya – for edifying purposes, the authorities said. There, the father and son Kadyrovs came to see him in the detention centre. The latter beat the unfortunate guy, while the former watched.

Video of the beating of Nikita Zhuravel in the Grozny pre-trial detention center

But the most incredible thing began after the beating. No one was punished for the obvious violation of the law. Kadyrovs’ actions were not condemned by any of the major Russian politicians. On the contrary – the 15-year-old was showered with awards and promotions. Despite his age, he became one of the commanders of his father’s security service and received nine awards in various Russian regions. The whole thing seemed like a dream – absurd and nightmarish. Even compared to everything else in Chechnya, where absurdity and nightmares have become the norm under Kadyrov, what was happening to Adam seemed too unbelievable. There was an awfully dramatic story behind the events of Adam Kadyrov’s life, which we will tell you more about later, but for now let us return to his father.

Throughout 2023, strange things were also happening to Ramzan Kadyrov himself. According to Chechen bloggers, the head of Chechnya was either suffering from an aggravation of a serious illness or had been poisoned. There was indirect evidence of this. Kadyrov, who always loved publicity stunts, suddenly began to disappear from public view. For example, he was not present at President Putin’s address to the Federal Assembly in February 2023. Even by official record, Kadyrov has taken three holidays in 2023. Occasionally appearing in front of the cameras, he seemed to confirm pessimistic insights about his health. Either with his appearance – he became obese and swollen, as in some serious illnesses, such as kidney disease. Or with his strange speeches, like this one:  

Rumours of Kadyrov’s illness reached a peak in September, when some people claimed that the Chechen ruler had allegedly fallen into a coma from which he would probably never recover. But even if Kadyrov really was in critical condition at the time, he soon recovered. Since mid-autumn he has been showing his face in public again and, as before, posting his own vertical videos on social networks.

Two of our sources close to the Chechen and Russian authorities say that Kadyrov did (and still does) have kidney problems, but apparently he has managed to solve them, at least for the time being. Because of these problems, the Chechen ruler has begun to prepare a successor, or rather successors – he has flooded the Chechen power vertical with members of his family. 

Ramzan Kadyrov truly knows better than anyone else how to struggle for power and keep it in one’s hands, kill both one’s allies and enemies for the sake of power, deceive and pretend, and do whatever it takes to keep on ruling.

The Prince

Like any dictator, Kadyrov is surrounded by myths, and many of these myths were created by him. For example, here is what he said about his early youth – the 1990s. Ramzan then had finished school in the Chechen-Ingush ASSR, which had already begun its fight for independence. Soon this republic would split into two, and Chechnya, or Ichkeria as it called itself, would begin an armed struggle against Moscow.

” [I] have been fighting since I was 15 years old. I know what war is. I am a great warrior, a good strategist. I love to fight. You could say I was born and raised in war,’ Ramzan Kadyrov said in a 2020 interview.

Some of you may also remember this story, which was circulated in the media: allegedly, Kadyrov killed his first Russian soldier at the age of 16. 

None of this is true. Kadyrov did not fight in the war at either the age of 15 or 16 because there was no war in Chechnya then, nor did he fight in 1995-96, and the hoax story about him killing Russians was popularised by the publicist Yulia Latynina. One eyewitness recalls that Ramzan received his first AK rifle in 1995 as a gift from the then influential Yamadayev clan. Remember this surname – the Yamadayevs will be mentioned several times in today’s film. Here is Ramzan standing with this rifle at a village meeting, but, as someone who knew him at the time tells us, he has never been in battle.

If Kadyrov didn’t fight, what was he doing in the 1990s? After school, the young man didn’t enrol anywhere. School was probably his only real education. Years later, Kadyrov would proclaim himself first a candidate and then a doctor of sciences, and even a member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences. This academy, as well as the universities where Kadyrov defended his theses, are bogus; a doctorate and membership there can be obtained for money or through patronage.

The main characteristic of Kadyrov in the 1990s was that he was a favourite son. Many of our interlocutors recall that Ramzan was always at his father’s side. His father Akhmat Kadyrov adored Ramzan, even though he had two sons. The eldest, Zelimkhan, or simply Zelim, as his peers called him, was the favourite of his mother, Aimani Kadyrova. The father, an extremely important figure in Chechen culture, would take young Ramzan with him everywhere, but hardly ever did so with Zelimkhan. This would later lead to a tragedy which we will tell you about later.

It was in this way – as his father’s chaperone – that Ramzan got to know the president of Ichkeria, the rebel general Dzhokhar Dudayev. In 1995, Kadyrov’s father was appointed mufti – that is, religious leader of the Chechens – and Ramzan was at his father’s side at this ceremony. The closeness of father and son is also illustrated by the following episode. In 2002 Kremlin officials, including head of Putin’s administration Alexander Voloshin, flew to Chechnya. At one point Akhmat Kadyrov asked a young man to enter the room. “This is my son Ramzan, he runs a sports club, could you take a picture with him?” the elder Kadyrov asked the Moscow guests. It seems likely that since then Kadyrov Jr. has never missed a single chance to be photographed with important people. 

It sounds humorous, but this is no laughing matter. Kadyrov Sr. has done a great deal to bring his favourite son into power. Yet the Russian security services and the Kremlin contributed no less to the future of Ramzan Kadyrov than his father did.

The First Chechen War is one of those wars whose outcome was decided not on the battlefield, but in Moscow’s offices. Guided by their political goals, different forces in Moscow would either escalate the conflict or suddenly freeze it at the moment when victory seemed to be at hand. In the spring of 1996, when Kadyrov Sr. was already the mufti of the separatists, military luck was on the side of the Russian army. Dzhokhar Dudayev, the head of Ichkeria, was killed by a precision missile hit, and the army took almost all the mountainous regions of Chechnya, forcing the insurgents into the forests. Yeltsin defiantly humiliated the new Chechen leaders. They were summoned to the Kremlin, scolded for being late, and then, while the Chechens slept in the Kremlin facility, Yeltsin himself made a blitz visit to Grozny. The Russian leader had an election looming – the most difficult of his career. To calm the population, he declared victory and a suspension of hostilities. It was Yeltsin’s only visit to Chechnya.

One of the former field commanders, who would later defect to the federal forces, described that moment as follows: “It would take just a bit more to bring Ichkeria to an end”. Yet this respite benefited the guerrillas, as if someone in Moscow was secretly helping them. 

Already in August 1996, the regrouped separatists captured Grozny, inflicting a humiliating defeat on the Russian army. After that Moscow agreed to sign the Khasavyurt peace treaty on 31 August 1996. According to the treaty, Chechnya de jure remained a part of Russia, but de facto it became an independent territory, where an internal conflict immediately began. There was only one purpose of such a peace – to postpone the resolution of Chechnya’s future until 2001, in other words, to delay a new war and to prepare for it.

It would be true to say that after 1996 anarchy reigned in Chechnya, which was brought about not only by the Chechens themselves, but also by Moscow. The Wahhabis, whose most prominent leaders were Shamil Basayev and Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, were gaining strength; on the other flank were the moderate field commanders like the aforementioned Yamadayev clan, and torn between them was the president of Ichkeria, Aslan Maskhadov, who had been elected to the post after Dudayev’s death. Each side was backed by armed detachments. In Chechnya, people were constantly being shot, killed and kidnapped, both newcomers and locals. Several times it looked as if a full-scale civil war was about to break out.

At the same time, almost all the forces in the seemingly independent Chechnya were supported from Moscow – with money, weapons and advice. It may sound unthinkable, but Boris Berezovsky, deputy secretary of the Russian Security Council, the man responsible for fighting extremism, personally handed Shamil Basayev bags of money. In 1999, this was revealed by the President of Ichkeria, Aslan Maskhadov, in an interview conducted by the Russian-born American journalist Paul Khlebnikov. Remember this name, we will return to his fate repeatedly. Years later, Berezovsky himself, already a political émigré, eventually admitted that he had indeed handed $2 million to Basayev at least once. In reality, there was much more money – the various Chechen forces received funds either directly from the Russian budget, in the form of hostage ransoms, or from the oil trade. Yes, the quasi-independent Chechnya was trading oil and petrol on Russian territory, and the money was going back to finance the armed groups.

In fact, the leaders of independent Chechnya themselves travelled freely between Moscow and Grozny as if there were no war. Here is Aslan Maskhadov meeting with Yeltsin in the Kremlin in May 1997. And here is Turpal Ali Atgeriyev, who during the war took hundreds of hostages in the village of Pervomayskoye, arriving in Moscow in the summer of 1999. With a gun. He was arrested, but immediately released. Imagine the organiser of the September 11 attacks on New York, coming to the USA after committing an act of terrorism, being detained but then released.

At the same time, Russian special services were actively working in Chechnya. They were in contact with many field commanders, even those who killed Russian soldiers. Here is how a former field commander with whom we spoke for this film describes this time: “The FSB worked with some, the Interior Ministry with others, the GRU with still others, everyone had their favourites.”

However, even among the favourites, there was the most favoured one. Meet Movladi Atlangeriyev, whom everyone used to call by a different name, Ruslan –  a common practice in Chechnya. He is a thief, a gangster, a man involved in many murders but at the same time a man who did much to bring the Kadyrov family to power. He led such a secretive life that the Russian press has never published a photograph of him. A sketch at most. And it wasn’t even of him. Here is a unique image of Atlangeriyev, found by the authors of this film. 

Ruslan started his criminal activities at a very young age – in the 70s, while still a teenager, he spent some time in Chernokozovo, a prison on the territory of Chechnya. Then he enrolled in a Moscow university, but eventually dropped out to become a professional criminal. Atlangeriyev and another Chechen – Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev, a name you should also remember – formed the Lazania organised crime group the gang was named after the Lazania Italian restaurant on Pyatnitskaya Street, where the OCG leaders met × , one of the most influential and violent gangs of the 1980s and 1990s. 

The most notorious crimes of the Lazania gang are:

1. The massacre at the Labyrinth restaurant on Novy Arbat in 1988

2. The Chechen aviso scam, 1992-1994

3. Murder of a top manager of the Spartak football club and her family, 1997

One could make a separate film about the Lazania gang – so important was the role it played at the dawn of the new Russian statehood. But for now let’s just say this: from some point in time, the Lazania gang was closely tied to the Russian security services. It would later turn out that some of the gang’s fighters had FSB IDs, and its third known leader, Maxim Lazovsky, was probably a security service agent as well. Atlangeriyev was also recruited. According to one version, the security services established contact with him back in the early 80s, the other says they got him hooked in the 90s when he was unexpectedly detained at Vnukovo airport while trying to fly abroad with a pistol in his luggage.

“After doing time, he returned to Chechnya. The authorities gave him a Mitsubishi Pajero two-door SUV and a thick gold chain around his neck to celebrate his release. He was the first Chechen to accept the title of “thief in law”. He would drive round the mountains with the window open, blasting Gipsy Kings songs. All the young people envied him,’ says Atlangeriyev’s Gudermes neighbour. 

1999. Two years remain before the end of the Khasavyurt truce – Chechnya and the Kremlin must decide whether to live together or apart. According to a high-ranking Kremlin official of the time, the security services began looking for candidates for the pro-Russian leadership of Chechnya at least as early as the summer of that year. In other words, the Kremlin did not consider the option of Chechnya’s secession. Atlangeriyev played an important role in the search for candidates. Ruslan had flats in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, and on Tverskaya Street in Moscow. It was in these two flats that the first meetings were held with those who were ready to lead the Chechen Republic. 

In general, the events of the summer and autumn of 1999 look like a poorly played operation by the special services. While the Kremlin was thinking about candidates for new Chechen leaders, the Wahhabis led by Shamil Basayev suddenly invaded Dagestan and are believed to have blown up apartment blocks in Russian cities, including Moscow. They seemed to have done this on purpose so that the Russian army would have an excuse to forget about the Khasavyurt truce and start a new Chechen war.

If there was any logic in Basayev’s actions, it was a very strange one. When the FSB archives are revealed, we will learn more about who really provoked the campaign against Dagestan and bombed houses in Russia, but for now let us say the main thing – since August 1999, the trials for a new leader of Chechnya have been held in the flat of the chief Chechen gangster quite openly. Chechnya urgently needed a pro-Russian leader!

Three participants in those negotiations tell the following story. Ruslan Atlangeriyev acted as the host of the meetings. The FSB, who were in charge of these interviews, was represented by deputy director of the service German Ugryumov. The Kremlin – by Vladislav Surkov, deputy head of the Presidential Administration. The process was supervised by then-Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his secretary Igor Sechin. According to one of the participants in those meetings, Sechin would personally drive the Chechens in his official car to meetings with Putin at the House of the Government in Moscow. 

At first, during meetings at Atlangeriyev’s flat in Makhachkala, the FSB screened the most influential Chechen clans – those with money or armed support. Ugryumov met with the Bazhayev family of businessmen and the Yamadayev brothers. When they refused, Akhmat Kadyrov, who Atlangeriyev had known since the 1990s, was called in. Ugryumov hated Kadyrov , according to an interlocutor who knew both men × , but there was no other option, as the hostilities in Chechnya were already in full swing. In addition, Kadyrov’s defection to the federal government looked promising from the PR standpoint – after all, the mufti was the one who had declared holy war on Russia under Dudayev. With his switch to the Kremlin’s side, the jihad would be over. Kadyrov agreed. Then he was taken to Moscow. According to one of the people who knew him well, after arriving in the capital, Kadyrov settled in Atlangeriyev’s flat on Tverskaya Street, from where he would be taken to meetings with Putin. 

Judging by subsequent events, the two men agreed on everything. Putin gave Kadyrov and his family Chechnya, and also a prayer mat. According to an acquaintance of the Kadyrovs, Akhmat was particularly proud of this mat. Before we get too far away from this point, we would like to repeat how the Kremlin has decided the future of Chechnya. One of the separatist leaders was brought to the flat of a professional gangster recruited by the FSB and handed a prayer rug as a sign of authority over the Chechen people for decades to come. Remember this fact whenever you wonder who brought the Kadyrov family to power.

But negotiation always means bargaining. One of the parties must offer something to the other in order to interest them. The Kremlin was desperate for a controlled Chechen leader and was prepared to pay generously. This part of the story struck us the most. Here are the conditions the Kremlin offered in negotiations with candidates for the head of Chechnya – to “hand over” a large city, for example, Novorossiysk, $5 million in cash right away, and a luxury house in Sochi. 

We asked what “handing over” meant. It meant allowing unrestricted racketeering in a major Russian city. In other words, the Kremlin was offering to give up part of its sovereignty in order to gain sovereignty over Chechnya. In the end, the Kadyrovs were “handed over” much more than Novorossiysk.

In June 2000 Ramzan’s father Akhmat Kadyrov was appointed head of the Chechen administration. This was a unique position – there were no other officials with such a title in Russia. Formally, Chechnya was ruled by Putin, because direct presidential rule was introduced in the republic for the duration of the war. Meanwhile, Kadyrov was learning to be a sultan. He really had a lot of catching up to do – like his son Ramzan, Akhmat Kadyrov had no education by 2000 except for a religious institute and combine harvester courses. Within a year he obtained a university degree in economics, and two years later a PhD in political science. The quality of these academic titles is quite obvious.

However, Ramzan’s father was indeed gifted in politics, says a former Kremlin official who knew him well. “He was very crafty, the kind they call slickster,” he described Kadyrov Sr.

Although Kadyrov was a quick learner, he was not ready for fair elections. Voting for the first president of Chechnya was scheduled for 2003, but Kadyrov was not a clear frontrunner in this race. That’s when the Kremlin intervened again. Here is how Malik Saidullayev, a well-known Chechen businessman, recalls the events of 2003. He then entered the election and had every chance of spoiling Kadyrov’s chances of victory. “I was called to office 419 in the 14th building of the Kremlin, where comrade Vladislav Surkov said ‘withdraw your candidacy, now is not the time.’ They offered me money, a million dollars or so, to kind of cover what I had already spent on the election. And the position of Putin’s aide. I said I wasn’t a sellout and wouldn’t submit to them. The other candidates, by the way, agreed to all the proposals. When I submitted my signatures to the Chechen election commission, Kadyrov’s men with guns surrounded the building, trying to scare me. But in the end my signatures were simply rejected by court order.

Let us reiterate – the Kremlin has at least twice been prepared to pay in black money just so that the people of its choice would lead Chechnya. As a result, Akhmat Kadyrov won the October 2003 elections with a result exceeding Putin’s – over 80% of the vote. 

Who was Ramzan back then? What was he doing? You remember we told you that the Kremlin bosses only saw Ramzan for the first time in 2002 – his father asked them to take a photograph with his heir. In other words, Ramzan was a nobody in the political sense. Our interlocutor who worked in the Kremlin at the time confirms that in 2003 no one thought of handing over power in Chechnya by succession. But everything would change decisively in a matter of six months.

Since 2000, Ramzan had been commander of an armed detachment under his father. It was formally called Akhmat Kadyrov’s security service, although its main purpose was something else – Ramzan helped the FSB capture separatist supporters in Chechnya. This was done by various methods – there were both genuine terrorists liquidated by Kadyrov’s men, and random people who were killed just to have something to report. “Ramzan set a reward of three to five thousand dollars for those who would bring him two things – the severed head of a militant and his passport. No other proof was required. People started simply killing their enemies, cutting off their heads and passing them off as militants,” describes a former acquaintance of Ramzan who left Chechnya. One way or another, Ramzan found himself on good terms with the security services. When he came to Moscow in the early 2000s, he even courted and dated the daughter of one of the deputy directors of the FSB, recalls an acquaintance of Ramzan’s. His father, on the contrary, suffered a lot from Moscow bosses during the first six months of his presidency. A former acquaintance of the family says that in the spring of 2004 Akhmat Kadyrov returned from a trip to the capital agitated: “I will not go to the Kremlin again,” he said. A retired Moscow official recalls that relations were indeed difficult, in particular Chechnya was constantly demanding revenue from the sale of local oil, and Moscow refused to go along with this.

And at that very moment, tragedy struck. Akhmat Kadyrov, Chechnya’s newly elected president, was killed by an explosion during a Victory Day parade on 9 May at the Dynamo stadium in Grozny. This was 20 years ago.

The death of Kadyrov Sr. is only the second time in the history of modern Russia that the head of a region has been forcibly deprived of his life. The first, a couple of years before Kadyrov, was the head of Magadan Oblast, who was shot dead by hired assassins in Moscow. There was a full-scale investigation into that incident, and Kadyrov’s death was largely put on the back burner, with militants getting all the blame. However, there were very, very many strange things about that explosion in Grozny. 

Let’s start with the main one. Ramzan himself was not present at the parade or in Chechnya at that moment, although, as you remember, he was then head of his father’s security service. An acquaintance of Kadyrovs’ and a former high-ranking Kremlin official say that on 9 May Kadyrov Jr. was in Moscow for the entire day. It is unclear what he was doing in the capital and why he was not at his father’s side. On the same day Ramzan would be brought to the Kremlin to meet Putin. Many people remember this picture – Ramzan Kadyrov in a blue tracksuit accepting condolences from a strictly dressed Putin. This meeting effectively marked the beginning of Ramzan’s reign. 

So who was guarding Akhmat Kadyrov at the stadium then? According to an acquaintance of Ramzan’s, he left his subordinate with the call sign Mamak in charge. The man’s full name is Magomed Israpilov, and he comes from Argun. “Large as a bear”, our interlocutor describes him. Kadyrov would later have this “bear”, his right-hand man, killed – in 2009, as Chechen bloggers wrote, he would let a lion loose on Mamak. This seems like fantasy, but it’s true. Judging by the way Kadyrov simultaneously massacred Mamak’s brother, it is easy to believe in execution by lion (especially since Kadyrov, like any self-respecting dictator, has a zoo with outlandish animals). Chechen bloggers wrote that “Mamak’s” brother Akhmed Israpilov was beheaded . However, as an illustration, the post by Chechen publicist Mairbek Taramov erroneously included a photograph from a Venezuelan prison × .

The second oddity is the remarkable selectivity of that attack. Normally, militants would try to arrange explosions with as many victims as possible – especially as there were hundreds of Chechen security forces gathered in the stadium stands that day, and the militants would obviously not have minded killing them. But no, the precisely targeted explosion went off right under the very chair in which Kadyrov Sr. was sitting. Look, thanks to this unique footage of the attack, which was shown the next day by the NTV television company, we have a chance to reconstruct what happened.  

Here is Kadyrov reviewing the parade. To his left is the head of the Chechen State Council, Hussein Isayev – he will die. During the parade he was constantly whispering with the chief, leaning towards him. To Kadyrov’s right is Russian General Valery Baranov, then commander of the Caucasus army. He was not whispering with Kadyrov, but his left leg was too close to the Chechen leader – and it was blown off by the explosion. The general survived and retired. In the aforementioned video, the NTV correspondent says the same thing: at the scene of the attack there were bloodstains in only three places – the ones where Kadyrov, Isayev and Baranov were sitting. Our source, who closely knows the father and son Kadyrovs, also says confidently that the explosion killed only two men and seriously wounded one. 

However, the day after the attack, the Chechen authorities reported that there were six victims, adding an unnamed girl, two of Kadyrov’s guards, also without names or titles, and Adlan Khasanov, a Chechen photo reporter working for Reuters. How did they die in a blast that didn’t even kill the man standing the closest to Kadyrov?! Here is where Khasanov was at the time of the explosion, as his colleagues told us. None of the reporters standing next to Khasanov were hurt. 

There was a theory at the time that at least Adlan Khasanov was killed not by the explosion at all, but by an accidental bullet fired by Kadyrov’s guards. If you look at the video, you can hear that there was indeed chaotic shooting and a crowd crush in the stadium – it remains unclear who was shooting at whom. There were definitely no militants in the stadium , as further investigation showed × . Here the author of the video reasonably advises his companion not to go near the explosion site, “lest you want to get killed by accident”. 

One last oddity. Place and time. As stated by the investigation, the militants planted explosives under the tribune in advance. According to the main version, they did it during the renovation of the stadium, which had been going on for the previous three months. In other words, someone was able to place a small bomb exactly under the seat where Kadyrov would later sit. That sounds unlikely. It seems even more unlikely if we consider that only the Chechen leader’s closest entourage knew about Akhmat Kadyrov’s upcoming visit to the Dynamo stadium. After all, just the day before Kadyrov Sr. had intended to review the parade elsewhere in Grozny, but changed his plans at the last moment.

Mysterious deaths, as well as mysterious events in general surrounding the Kadyrov family, did not end there. Let us once again show this image, which many people remember – this is how most Russians learnt about Kadyrov. The photo shows a young Ramzan in a tracksuit and Putin in a business suit. Putin was speaking words of condolence over the death of Kadyrov Sr, while his son looked like a deeply shaken man at the very least. A former top official in Moscow says that it was at this meeting that Putin made it clear to Ramzan that he would be the next head of Chechnya. Even if we accept that passing on power by succession is normal in a modern state, a logical question arises – why was power passed to Akhmat Kadyrov’s youngest son? According to all feudal laws, it should have gone to the eldest son, and if you remember, Ramzan had a brother, Zelimkhan. After all, the youngest son couldn’t have been made heir just because on the day of his father’s death, he happened to be not near him, but in Moscow.

No, that was certainly not the reason. Behind the transfer of power in Chechnya lies a dramatic personal story, many details of which you will learn for the first time today.

Zelimkhan is two years older than Ramzan. During the first Chechen war he did not take part in the fighting either, he “sat at home”, as his acquaintance puts it. Our interlocutor calls his former friend a “keif-chaser”, meaning that Zelimkhan was addicted to drugs, and by the time his father died in 2004 he was using quite heavy substances. In addition to his drug problems, or perhaps because of them, Zelimkhan would constantly get into increasingly ugly stories – he would fight with people he didn’t like and flaunt his weapons. Back in 1997 Zelimkhan’s temper led to a tragedy. At a petrol station in Chechnya, he got into an argument with another customer, a Chechen from Nozhai-Yurt, threatened him with a pistol, and accidentally (according to an eyewitness) shot the opponent, killing him on the spot . We retell this story from the words of an eyewitness × . After that, the entire Kadyrov family hid from the blood feud for some time. This story later ended with a reconciliation. When Akhmat Kadyrov became Chechen leader, Zelimkhan did not let up. After another drunken outing with weapons he was briefly detained in Kislovodsk. But he could get away with it all. Zelimkhan was repeatedly involved in car accidents, including one that was quite serious. He would also put his eldest son – who was not even ten years old – behind the wheel and let him drive around the village. 

At the time of his father’s death, Zelimkhan was a senior officer in the Chechen police. It wasn’t much of a position, and Zelimkhan held it purely formally – he was mostly misbehaving at home, his acquaintance says. Apparently, Zelimkhan was burdened by the fact that his father always favoured his younger brother.

This is the old Kadyrov family house in Tsentaroy. Nowadays, if you look at satellite images, you can see the palaces that Ramzan has built for his large family. But in those years there were only fields around the house, or “zelenka”, as the Chechens themselves have called it since the war. The old house consisted of three parts – since the 90s, one part had been occupied by the father, another by Zelimkhan, who had grown up and married, and the third by Ramzan, who also brought at least one of his wives here (we’ll talk about this separately, though). 

By 2004 Akhmat and Ramzan continued to live in their ancestral house, while Zelimkhan was moved to a house on the other side of the street. Here it is on the archive satellite image. It was in this new house that Zelimkhan received the news of his father’s death. According to his acquaintance, for several days Zelimkhan was literally out of control. One day he broke into his brother’s house with a gun acting aggressively. Another time Zelimkhan decided to search his own house for wiretaps, and according to his acquaintance, he did find them. “The relationship between Ramzan and Zelimkhan at that moment was not very good, to put it mildly,” says an acquaintance of both brothers. “Besides, an older brother, especially one l like that, was a constant threat to Ramzan.” That threat was gone on 31 May 2004: some three weeks after his father’s death, Zelimkhan Kadyrov died mysteriously.

It happened in the same new house across the street from Ramzan’s home. Authorities reported that Zelimkhan died in his sleep of heart failure caused by the aftermath of the same serious car accident he had been in earlier. Ramzan also said that Zelimkhan was heavily affected by his father’s death.

This is the last lifetime photo of Ramzan Kadyrov’s older brother taken at their father’s funeral. You can see that he is really shaken by what has happened. Ramzan never spoke much about the circumstances of his brother’s last years and days. Sometimes, on mourning anniversaries, Ramzan would post touching family photos on social networks. Here is the older brother hugging the younger, here they are fooling around. “I would check if Ramzan has anything to do with his brother’s death,” says an acquaintance of Zelimkhan. Curiously, on the day of his brother’s death, Ramzan was not around either – he was once again in Moscow, attending a reception with Putin. 

Naturally, no investigation into the deaths of the two Kadyrovs in the space of three weeks has ever taken place. Ramzan would later appoint one of his late brother’s sons as Chechnya’s sports minister. His other nephew – the one who was allowed to drive a car as a minor – would get into an accident and die at the age of just 13. 

2004 marked a dramatic turning point in the Kadyrov family. There would be much more bloodshed to come, but after the deaths of his father and brother, age was the only thing keeping Ramzan from becoming the leader of the Chechens.

Ramzan was only 27 years old in 2004, whereas the minimum age to become president of Chechnya was 30. Moreover, at that time there were still plenty of Chechens around Kadyrov who could compete with the young heir in terms of ambition and wealth. In short, Ramzan had rivals and something had to be done about it.

First Ramzan and the Kremlin had to find someone who would agree to serve as president for a while and then hand over the office uncomplainingly to Kadyrov Jr., who had grown three years older. This person was Alu Alkhanov, who had worked as a policeman since Soviet times. People who know him describe Alkhanov as a good man with principles and authority. Yet he has been used rudely and derisively.

Alkhanov’s candidature was put forward right at the memorial service for Zelimkhan Kadyrov. Ramzan was not even deterred by the fact that the candidate himself was not around at the time of his nomination. Alkhanov was away at another funeral – his father was being buried in the mountains. It was absurd – a man was nominated for the presidency in his absence. Secondly, the Kremlin did everything it could to remove all significant rivals from the election – as a result, Alkhanov was competing with people whose names no one in Chechnya has ever heard before or since. Saidullayev was once again disqualified from the election on the comical pretext that his Russian passport had been found to have some blots in it. But even this was not enough – people knew little about Alkhanov and he might not have won the first round. To ensure his victory, Putin took an unprecedented step – he flew to Chechnya in August 2004 and, standing in front of the cameras, promised to give the republic all the proceeds from the sale of Chechen oil. This was a cherished wish of the Chechens during the war of secession from Russia. In the end, however, Putin’s generosity did not bring the Chechens much economic benefit, as we will tell you in the second part of our film.

This photograph is very indicative: it gives an insight into the real state of affairs in Chechnya in 2004. Kadyrov and Alkhanov are talking to Putin. Ramzan is flamboyant and self-confident, he looks like he is in charge. Alkhanov looks down at the floor dejectedly. Sometimes it seemed that Kadyrov was literally mocking his protégé. For example, before the election it turned out that Ramzan was also supporting one of Alkhanov’s rivals, just to spite him. 

Alkhanov eventually won the first round, but Kadyrov’s bullying would continue. Although the word “bullying” is not quite adequate to describe the methods by which Ramzan Kadyrov fought his rivals. Kadyrov literally paved his way to the presidency in blood. Each of the episodes described below should have become the subject of a criminal investigation. But none of them did.

Summer 2004. Alkhanov has not even been elected president of Chechnya yet, and the election campaign is in full swing. The question on the agenda is who will be the head of the Chechen government under the new president. The post of prime minister, although second in importance, is a crucial one – the head of the government controls the very financial flows coming from the federal budget to the republic. The prime minister at the time was an appointee from Moscow, a young financier called Sergei Abramov. The Kadyrovs did not like him, but tolerated him for the time being. Before him, two Russian prime ministers of Chechnya – Mikhail Babich and Anatoly Popov – had already been dismissed on Akhmat Kadyrov’s instructions. Popov was dismissed after someone poisoned him during a visit to a Chechen village. Popov’s condition was very serious, his liver was badly damaged. Kadyrov Sr then simply stated that the republic had no need for a diseased prime minister. Popov would never return to Chechnya again. There was no investigation into the poisoning. Popov’s place was taken by Abramov, who apparently knew what he was agreeing to. The first accident happened to him right in the summer of 2004. A landmine exploded next to his car in Grozny. The bodyguard sitting next to Abramov was killed. 

This is actually a very illustrative story. Abramov was driving an old armoured Volga, which was on the balance sheet of the Russian military forces in Grozny. One of the Kremlin officials we spoke to had driven this same Volga in Chechnya back in 1999. “They would put a piece of iron under my arse, and two military hulks in body armour would sit on either side of me. And in this cramped state we would drive at breakneck speed,” the source describes. At the same time, by 2004 the Chechen leadership was already driving Mercedes. So why did Chechen prime minister Abramov drive an old Volga, with bodyguards from the military, not from Chechnya? Perhaps he had reasons not to trust Kadyrov? One way or another, Abramov did not take the first hint, and in 2005 a new misfortune befell him. In November of that year he got into a serious car accident in Moscow. Right near Rublyovka his now armoured Mercedes was rammed by a truck. 

It happened at the exact moment when Abramov was on his way to a plane to Chechnya – parliamentary elections were planned there, the course of which he was supposed to control as head of the government. Here is a description of Abramov’s injuries that was leaked to the press:

“Sergei Borisovich is in intensive care. He has a fracture of the 10th and 11th ribs. He was sutured a ruptured kidney. He also has fractures of the hip joint, and his liver has been glued”.

Very serious injuries, to put it mildly. Abramov did not fly to Chechnya, and control over the elections, as well as over the money going to the republic, automatically passed to Ramzan Kadyrov, who at that time formally held the post of deputy prime minister of Chechnya. As a result, the parliamentary elections in Chechnya were won by candidates wholly loyal to Ramzan, and Abramov quietly left his post some time later, ceding it to Kadyrov Jr. The former Chechen prime minister is now involved in the VR business. He categorically declined to speak to us for this film. 

December 2005. Rudnik Dudayev, secretary of the Chechen Security Council, dies in Chechnya under strange circumstances. He was a Chechen who had worked in the KGB and FSB since Soviet times. In the 1980s he kept an eye on Islamic organisations in Uzbekistan, where Akhmat Kadyrov was then studying. The KGB then controlled all religious universities. When the USSR collapsed, Dudayev – who, by the way, is not related to the assassinated Ichkerian leader Dzhokhar Dudayev – began a career in the FSB. 

Under Kadyrov Sr. he became secretary of the Chechen Security Council – that is, the man who co-ordinates the work of all the security forces in Chechnya. A telling detail is that Dudayev lived right on the territory of the government complex in Grozny under the protection of the Russian military and the FSB. All the officials sent from Moscow lived in small caravans on this territory. Could it be that for some reason they too did not trust Kadyrov and his men? On 11 December 2005, right in the middle of the day, the caravan with Dudayev caught fire and the high-ranking FSB official suffocated to death from carbon monoxide. The most interesting thing is that his caravan is the only one that, for unknown reasons, burst into flames twice that year. The first time Dudayev was away and was not hurt, but the second time ended badly. There was no investigation into his death. The deceased was replaced as head of the Security Council by Ramzan’s aide.

Finally, in April 2006, in the centre of Grozny, the guards of Kadyrov, who was then prime minister of the republic, clashed with the guards of President Alkhanov, and blood was spilled. Just imagine for a second – it would be the same as if the guards of Prime Minister Mishustin had clashed with the guards of President Putin in the centre of Moscow. 

Nevertheless, no one was punished for the incident. Kadyrov was humiliating his boss by all means, constantly being on his back. Communications were frequently cut off in Alkhanov’s office, Kadyrov would sack his subordinates without saying a word to him. The most comical episode of this confrontation was as follows. Singer Nikolai Baskov came to Chechnya on tour. He is known for being able to perform any song, even the most tasteless, for a generous fee. Here he is singing an obviously customised song about the beauty of Grozny. At one point Alu Alkhanov decided to award Baskov the title of Honoured Artist of Chechnya. But then Kadyrov intervened – he declared Baskov a People’s Artist of Chechnya. Alkhanov had to agree. 

According to a former Kremlin official, Putin was in no rush to dismiss Alkhanov until the end. His handlers in the Interior Ministry and other security agencies pleaded for the Chechen president, but Putin had personal commitments to Ramzan – he had promised him the republic back in 2004, during that very meeting in a tracksuit. In the end, it was Alkhanov himself who couldn’t take it anymore – in February 2007 he resigned and went into an undeserved political retirement – he was given the insignificant post of deputy justice minister , which he still holds × , and was also allowed to oversee ethics in the Russian football league. Nothing is known about Alkhanov’s achievements in this field; he simply disappeared into the depths of the Russian bureaucracy. But we do hear about ethics in Russian football very often – and all thanks to Kadyrov. Here he is shouting at referees from the stands in Grozny, and here his men are beating up players from other teams near the changing rooms. Naturally, nothing was done to Kadyrov for these offences either. However, compared to the crimes we have already described, Kadyrov’s football offences are mere childish mischief.

Since February 2007 Ramzan has been the sole ruler of Chechnya. By that time he had already turned 30, and there was nothing to prevent the young ruler from becoming president of his native republic. Let us summarise the first period of Kadyrov’s biography: the security services, gangsters and President Vladimir Putin personally did everything to ensure that the Kadyrov family came to power. Nevertheless, Kadyrov’s father has a disagreement with Moscow and it was at this point that he died under strange circumstances. Ramzan Kadyrov’s older brother, who had the right to challenge him for power, also died mysteriously soon after. Putin essentially appointed Ramzan as his father’s successor. All of Ramzan’s rivals in his struggle for power either mysteriously died or gave up and went into the shadows as a result of intimidation and direct violence. Nothing – neither murder nor corruption – could lead to even opening an investigation against Kadyrov. He has absolute immunity.

There is one more thing to add to this frightening picture: by Ramzan Kadyrov’s first term as president, there was probably not a single person left alive who took part in his rise to power. Except Putin, of course. For instance, Movladi Atlangeriyev, in whose flat Akhmad Kadyrov stayed, was kidnapped in Moscow in January 2008, taken to Chechnya and apparently executed there. Kadyrov’s men were suspected, but again there was no investigation. Atlangeriyev’s partners in the Lazania gang also perished – FSB-affiliated Maxim Lazovsky was shot dead by unknown assailants in Moscow in 2000, Khozh Akhmed Nukhayev vanished without a trace, another gang leader Lechi Islamov was arrested by the FSB and mysteriously died in prison – presumably from poisoning. Finally, deputy head of the FSB German Ugryumov, who was the first to meet the Kadyrovs, died suddenly in 2001. He went to a bathhouse at a military base in Grozny together with Putin’s KGB acquaintance Umarpasha Khanaliyev and did not come out alive. It was announced that Ugryumov’s heart had failed.

There will be many more deaths, lies and theft in Kadyrov’s further biography. However, there will also be a lot of love.

The Sultan

What did the Kremlin gain by putting Kadyrov on the Chechen throne and turning a blind eye to the crimes he may have been involved in? One might have assumed that in exchange the federal centre would receive an obedient republic where the laws and rules that apply in the rest of Russia would be observed.

However, exactly the opposite has happened. Under Kadyrov, Chechnya has effectively withdrawn from the Russian legal framework, becoming a unique region with its own army and its own essentially Sharia law, where, unlike the rest of the country, the death penalty is actually in force, where colossal sums of money are stolen and no one is punished for it. In short, it is as if Kadyrov has turned Chechnya back into Ichkeria – a state independent of Moscow, or, to put it simply, a sultanate.

How much the Russian state pays Kadyrov for his loyalty is one of the main secrets of present-day Chechnya. We will try to give some general figures. Since the first years of the Kadyrov clan’s rule, Chechnya has been receiving more than a billion dollars annually from the federal budget , according to federal budget data × . 

This is a very substantial sum, but of course that’s not all of it; only direct transfers for the so-called “balancing of the republic’s budget” are taken into account here. In reality, Chechnya also receives huge amounts of money for social expenditure – salaries of state employees and all sorts of benefits. Kadyrov’s love of boasting on camera sometimes fails him. Here he names a much larger sum – over 300 billion rubles a year, or roughly $3 billion. . As further explanations made clear, Kadyrov included in this sum both direct subsidies and payments from the Pension Fund and the Social Insurance Fund in the region, which, formally speaking, do not count as aid from the federal centre to Chechnya × What is this comparable to? Well, for example, the annual budget of Bashkortostan according to the republic’s 2023 budget, expenditures totalled 285.1 billion rubles × , where there are hundreds of working enterprises and about three times the population. Or, for example, Facebook once paid $1 billion to buy Instagram, so beloved by Kadyrov. That is, every year Putin gives Chechnya three Instagrams.

However, such calculations are always superficial. Besides, no other Russian region had actually gone through a war just 20 years ago. Let’s assume that the Chechen people really need $3 billion annually. Then I suppose the republic should live in prosperity. Ironically, this is definitely not the case. The average salary in Chechnya is about 30,000 rubles , according to Rosstat, it’s between 24,000 and 37,589 rubles × , one of the lowest in the country. Every third family in Chechnya lives below the poverty line . according to the regional programme “Reducing the proportion of the population with incomes below the subsistence minimum in the Chechen Republic” × .

And next to this poverty you have all probably seen this:  

If it is true that a poverty-stricken childhood makes a person more susceptible to material temptations, then Ramzan Kadyrov is a perfect example of this rule. The Kadyrovs were not a wealthy family. When Akhmat Kadyrov decided to become an Islamic theologian and went to Bukhara to study, he was given money by a wealthy acquaintance, originally from Gudermes , their fellow countryman said × . The same rich patron named Umar, who in the USSR was known as a “tsekhovik”, bought Ramzan’s father his first car. The Kadyrovs did not earn much in the 1990s either. Saidullayev recalls that back in the mid-90s, Ramzan used to go round the neighbours with an empty bucket, asking for petrol to fill up his motorbike. Then the Kadyrovs got a Niva SUV, which was given to the Mufti’s family by the terrorist Shamil Basayev, who back then was an idol of the young Ramzan.

Here is a rare photo – it was taken in Gudermes shortly after the end of the first war. Detachment commanders gathered for prayer and the religious dance of zikr, recalls a participant in this photo shoot. Ramzan came here as the son of a mufti, and as we remember, he always liked to be photographed with famous people – first with Basayev, then with Kremlin officials. By the way, the photo was taken in the house of the Yamadayev brothers, who gave Ramzan his first automatic rifle. Then they also gave the mufti’s family a second car – a white Mitsubishi Pajero , their mutual acquaintance recalls × . 

Despite his impoverished youth, Ramzan liked to make an impression, to “show off”, says his acquaintance. This is probably the earliest video of the current Chechen leader, from the early 90s, when Chechnya was just beginning its fight for secession from Russia. The video shows several times people with guns, but without the green collars and beards that militants would start wearing en masse with the beginning of the jihad against Russia, which Ramzan’s father proclaimed in 1995. Ramzan is festively dressed, white top, white moccasins, he follows an unknown woman in a dance. Women, and the younger the better, are another of Ramzan Kadyrov’s passions, about which we will talk about a lot further on.

The Kadyrov family began getting some money in the late 1990s. Under Maskhadov they were given one oil well from the Soviet era – it was in the village of Vinogradnoye. Soon the Kadyrovs bought five KAMAZ trucks equipped with homemade tanks, and started hauling the homemade oil for sale in Russia – we know this from the accounts of two acquaintances of the Kadyrov family × .

After the Kadyrovs swore allegiance to Putin, little changed in their shady business. Instead of speculating in oil, they started trading in petrol through the Leader petrol stations scattered across Chechnya. In fact, the huge business of the Kadyrov family began with these petrol stations. They were named after Akhmad Kadyrov, the leader of Chechnya. With what money did the former mufti and his son manage to start their large fuel business? As you remember, the Kremlin offered millions of dollars to those Chechens who would agree to switch to the Russian side. Money does work.

This is where everything originated – the Ramzan sports club in Gudermes. This Chechen town is probably the only one in Chechnya that has survived all the wars relatively unscathed. The reason is that the town was controlled by the Yamadayev clan, which defected to the federal forces.

There were many administrative buildings in Gudermes, which the Kadyrov family simply took over as soon as they came to power. The Ramzan club moved into the Soviet-era Mayak department store . The club still exists today, but it is called Akhmat, in honour of the deceased Kadyrov Sr. × . Downstairs is a gym, and upstairs are rooms for business negotiations. Ramzan was in charge of all financial matters under his father, says Proekt’s interlocutor, who knew the family well: “It got to the point that during the day Akhmat (Kadyrov) would gather people in his office, and in the evening the same people would come to Ramzan’s club to solve their problems for money. If someone wanted to buy a position in the administration or secure a government contract, they would go to Ramzan.” The Kadyrov family’s underground business empire was run from this club. 

Following the petrol station network, Chechnya has seen the growth of an extensive web of companies and organisations secretly owned by the Kadyrov family, dominating almost all areas of the republic’s economy. 

Look, this is the cover of the Leader magazine, which was published in Chechnya. Expensive paper, high-quality printing. You can tell from the title that even this magazine is part of the Kadyrovs’ empire. The word “Leader” is present in the names of many firms connected with this family.

 In 2007, the magazine published a photograph of a pensive Ramzan – in fact, this entire issue is devoted exclusively to him. And here is a poem about Ramzan:

“At the festive table, you lead the cheer,

In the fiery dance, an eagle, so clear.

You charge into battle, first in the fray,

Homeland and honor, two wings that display.”

Let us reiterate once again – this is 2007, the republic is desperately short of everything, people in villages have neither gas nor sewerage, and meanwhile Ramzan is printing a magazine about himself on expensive paper. Ramzan has always liked to show off, as you remember his acquaintance saying.

But it’s not about showing off. The whole of Chechnya’s economy belongs to Kadyrov. You don’t even need to carry out a deep investigation to discover this – they outright register expensive assets in their names. The Minutka shopping centre on the square of the same name, the Tiinalla hotel on the shore of a picturesque reservoir in the suburbs of the Chechen capital and the Grozny taxi company are registered to Ramzan’s nineteen-year-old daughter Tabarik , according to SPARK data × . Grozny’s largest market, Berkat, is owned by his first wife, Medni Kadyrova. A similar market in the town of Argun is owned by Aimani’s mother. The family clinic AyMed is registered to the 84-year-old Zalpa Aidamirova, Medni’s mother and Ramzan’s mother-in-law all data here and above are from SPARK × .

Other assets are managed through the Akhmat Kadyrov Foundation, formally run by Ramzan’s mother. This is the most incredible non-profit organisation in Russia. It fundamentally refuses to disclose its financial records, as required by law, and gets away with it. The foundation accumulates huge sums of money received as tribute from big business and ordinary Chechens. Then it sets up companies, which in turn receive government contracts. It’s a vicious circle of stealing state money. First Kadyrov extracts budget funding from Moscow, and then gives it to his own companies, not to ordinary Chechens. For example, MegaStroyInvest, a subsidiary of the foundation, has received government contracts totalling 24 billion rubles , based on an analysis of data from the Contour.Focus government procurement service × . And there are many more examples.

When we studied the connections in Kadyrov’s companies, we sometimes literally clutched our heads – we just couldn’t believe the audacity of it all. Kadyrov is not just corrupt, he is blatantly corrupt. For example, look – this is Akhmad Aydamirov.

He’s just Kadyrov’s nominee. He is listed as the owner of the auto repair shops at the Leader petrol stations, he owns the burger restaurant opened by Ramzan Kadyrov and the ubiquitous rapper Timati, the Gorny Klyuch children’s camp in the Shalinsky district, where Kadyrov brought Ukrainian children for re-education, and the company that rents premises to the Chechnya branch of Moscow State University. Why the MSU needs a Chechnya branch is a separate question, but we’ll leave it for another investigation.

Or here is another of Ramzan Kadyrov’s nominees, his Tsentaroy neighbour Movsadi Alviyev. He owns the Shali-City hotel in the district centre of the same name, the architectural organisation Chechenproekt, which receives government construction contracts, the company “Electric Communications in the Chechen Republic”, which provides Chechens with Internet access, and finally the Grozny-City company, which holds stakes in a multitude of Chechen businesses, from halal burger trading to car dealerships. The Onyx company, also registered to Alviyev, is engaged in rubbish collection in Chechnya. In other words, this Alviyev controls almost everything in Chechnya. 

If you are confused by these intricacies of Chechen business, we’ll put it even more simply: Kadyrov has appointed his relatives as ministers of the Chechen government, and his nominees, cronies and fellow villagers as heads of front companies. As a result, the former simply give the latter state money in the form of government contracts. This is an outrageous scheme of rampant embezzlement within an entire region. 

However, everything we’ve told you so far shows how money is stolen from the budget, but no one has shown you before how this money ends up literally in Kadyrov’s pocket. We have found probably the main channel through which Ramzan, his family and friends cash in the money they have stolen. No one has ever before told publicly what you are about to see and hear now. The sources who have helped us in our investigation are risking their lives because we are talking about literally billions of dollars.

Meet Benofon, Orbita and Izumrud. Two of them , according to SPARK estimates × are among the top Chechen companies in terms of revenue, which means that they should be serious, big firms.

However, even with the naked eye, it is clear that these are so-called sham companies, i.e. firms created for dubious purposes – for example, to legalise stolen money through them. If you look at the reports of these companies, they hold assets worth 150 billion rubles. This is over $1.5 billion, and there simply cannot be companies of this scale in the Chechen economy. 

If you take a closer look at these sham companies, which we did, you will discover the sensational fact that these are Kadyrov’s personal wallets, through which he receives money stolen from the budget or paid in the form of annuities by those businessmen who enjoy the patronage of the Chechen leadership.

Let us give you a clear example. This is Khas-Magomed Kadyrov, he is Ramzan’s nephew and the mayor of Grozny (you’ve already learnt that this is normal in Chechnya). 

As Grozny mayor, Khas-Magomed receives money from the budget – almost 8 billion rubles a year. Then he gives almost 1.5 billion rubles out of this sum to Benofon in the form of contracts for the repair of all schools and city improvement. And he doesn’t just give it away – the mayor’s office transfers the money in the form of 1,400 almost always equal tranches. Anything can happen in business, but for the parties to agree on such a contract clause seems nonsensical. The parties are clearly in cahoots – the mayor’s office is simply funnelling money to Benofon.   

Benofon received the equivalent of $8 million for the fictitious repair of such schools! In other words, 16% of all federal aid to the Chechen capital went directly to some sham company. 

You may have thought that was the end of the story. But this is just the beginning. The total amount of Benofon’s revenue in 2023 alone is 64 billion roubles – that’s almost $700 million, or half of the annual budget of the whole of Chechnya , according to Benofon’s financial records handed over to us by a source and verified by Proekt × . With that kind of money, the firm should be thriving, with a respectable office overlooking the centre of Moscow, rather than a single employee, apparently an accountant, submitting fake reports to the tax authorities. The whole process is structured as follows: the bulk of the money came from 100 private companies and budgetary organisations. The budget funds include, for example, the very money stolen from Grozny’s budget under the guise of repairing schools. Another part of this money (16.3 billion rubles) came from companies controlled by Ramzan Kadyrov’s men and receiving government contracts. For example, Benofon received 3.2 billion from the MegaStroyInvest, which is essentially owned by Kadyrov’s family.

Another part of the payments look like payments to Kadyrov for law-enforcement support or cash-in services. For example, the Promenergostroy company from Surgut transferred half a billion rubles, the Glavstroy company from Mosow Oblast – 700 million, and so on. 

So, Benofon holds half of Chechnya’s budget. Where does this money go? As you can imagine, the firm itself can do nothing – it has no full-time employees and no subcontractors. It’s a 100% sham company. Therefore, the money is simply transferred to private individuals and cashed out , according to the financial records of Benofon that we have studied × . Again, billions of dollars are simply withdrawn from ATMs.

Look at this: these are 15 mostly young Chechens, with no business, no clear income, no credit history.

These 15 people, almost all of them natives of the Shalinsky district, received 48 billion roubles, that is, almost $537 million, in the form of… interest-free loans, i.e. irrevocably , according to the documents at our disposal × . That looks like venture capital investment. Let us introduce some of the startuppers who received colossal sums of money in their first investment round.

Here is Muslim Muradov. He is 30 years old and works in Shali as a taxi driver.  In just three days in December 2023, Muradov received 4.6 billion rubles from Benofon , according to the financial records at our disposal × . Not a bad tip. Muradov also received similar loans from other sham companies on our list. The total amount of investments in the taxi driver from Shali is 14 billion rubles. Where did they go? Simple. Our startupper just immediately turned virtual money into real money.

In particular, Muradov simply received 11 billion rubles in cash at a branch of the state-owned VTB Bank. To give you an idea, that’s just over two tonnes in 5,000-ruble notes. Bank compliance, counterparty due diligence? Never heard of it. 

Muradov spent another 8.4 billion buying precious metal bars from VTB Bank. That’s over a tonne more. 

Finally, Muradov transferred the remaining 3-plus billion rubles to third parties, also disguised as an interest-free loan. 

The taxi driver from Shali carried out all these multi-billion transactions in just three days on New Year’s Eve. He closed the financial year, as they say.

The other startuppers are much the same. 

Duk-Vakha Movsurov, who works as head of the housing and utilities department of the Vedensky district, received 4.6 billion rubles worth of loans from Benofon. 

The 28-year-old Ayub Berdukayev from Serzhen-Yurt was prosecuted for stealing 13,000 roubles just five years ago. Now he has helped cash in 2.2 billion. 

The 24-year-old car welder Ayubkhan Mudayev, who usually patches Russian cars in Shali, received a loan of almost 800 million rubles in January-February 2024 , all these financial transactions are confirmed by the documents at our disposal × .

And these 15 people are just some of the many ordinary participants in this scheme.

By definition, this scheme must be visible to the Russian tax authorities and even more so to the intelligence services. No one hides the blatant theft here at all, on the contrary, they boast about it. But nobody investigates it, just like the murders in Kadyrov’s entourage. Because the Kremlin, having once given Kadyrov the whole of Chechnya, doesn’t want to ask questions. 

However, the economic interests of Ramzan and his numerous relatives and cronies have long since expanded beyond the borders of Chechnya. Now they are global raiders. Meet Pavel Krotov and Sergei Kropachev. 

These two men also work as nominees in whose names Kadyrov and his entourage register huge businesses in Russia. Kropachev, for example, has a stake in the Starbucks coffee chain, which has left Russia. Formally speaking, Starbucks sold its Russian business to rapper Timati:

But in reality, it was sold to this man: 

It was probably through the same Kropachev that Kadyrov also received a stake in the Russian branch of McDonald’s. 

And Krotov is a unique nominee, a Chechen variety. Numerous Moscow businesses forcibly taken over by Kadyrov’s men were registered in his name. Moreover, Krotov himself, according to a person who knew him, suffered the same experience – at one point the Kadyrovites forced him into submission by kidnapping one of his relatives. In 2022, Krotov even sued Proekt journalists, claiming that he was not working for Kadyrov. No one wants to be associated with Kadyrov, not even his handymen.

What does Kadyrov need money for? Of course, he loves the beautiful life. We won’t annoy you with a new list of Kadyrov’s expensive property. Instead, let us tell you about the Chechen sultan’s most important passion, which costs him a lot of money. 

Ramzan Kadyrov is very fond of women. He has several permanent wives, although Russian law forbids polygamy, and a huge number of concubines. Concubines is not quite an accurate term, though. As two of Ramzan’s acquaintances explain, for the duration of his relationships with women, the Chechen leader ordered local mullahs to register a so-called Nikah – that is, an Islamic marriage. This protects the women from accusations of fornication, although it doesn’t help much. There are many beautiful girls in Chechnya who live with the stigma of being Kadyrov’s former concubines, who were deprived of their virginity by the sultan and then not taken as wives. However, this is still the most innocent part of the story.

It is no secret to the average Chechen that the sultan has a harem. Listen to the song ‘My Nanak’, performed by the popular Chechen singer Tamila Sagaipova in 2012. This song is not well known in Russia, but it was widely discussed in Chechnya.

From a musical point of view, it is an ordinary lezginka in an electronic arrangement. The language is a mixture of Chechen, Russian and slang. The main thing in this song is the lyrics – many of Kadyrov’s concubines are listed in the second verse. “Nanak” is actually a slightly modified pet name for Ramzan Kadyrov, whom the children call “Nanat”.  In other words, the singer addresses Kadyrov as gently as possible, as a family member. The thing is that Tamila Sagaipova herself used to be part of the harem of the head of Chechnya.

We will now translate the key part of the song for you.

Good evening, my love, Nanak. 

Good evening, girls. 

As you know, we are gathered at the contest. 

Everyone thinks she’s number one. 

I’ve come to prove that’s not true.

My darling, my darling,

My nearest and dearest Nanak. 

My little heart is calling for you. 

I alone, I alone am Nanak’s smallest.

I’ll caress my Nanak tenderly. 

You girls, rest.

Today is my victory,

So today we’ll honour me.

Fatima taps her foot,

Khadija is too smart for her own good.

Madina has the looks of a puppy,

Zamira is a duckling.

Kameta is like the wind,

Hut Nasha has lost her rhythm, 

Luisa is pleased with herself,

Elina is a weak case.

“Basiak” suffers a lot,

We’ll cut off Amina’s fingernails,

Asya is quiet.

I’ll outdo you all! 

Girls, girls, I say all this with love! 

Girls, girls, we can’t do without each other!

Girls, girls, we’re the KRA Ramzan Kadyrov’s initials × Mafia!

We have identified all the women hiding behind these names (and an affectionate pet nickname in one case). For ethical reasons, we won’t tell you about all of them, but some of their stories can’t be ignored – they reveal a completely inhuman image of the Chechen ruler.

So, meet the Chechen leader’s main wives: Medni Kadyrova, Fatima Khazuyeva, Aminat Akhmadova and Zamira (Indira by passport) Dzhabrailova.

Everyone knows about Medni Kadyrova – she is officially presented by Ramzan as his only wife, as is required by Russian law. Like all other Kadyrov’s women, she is very wealthy. In order to hide her expensive property, they even invented a fictitious identity for Kadyrov’s wife – she has a second passport in the name of Medni Musayeva.

Kadyrov’s propaganda claims that Medni has given birth to 14 of Ramzan’s children by age 42. This, of course, is not true. The truth is that Kadyrov simply takes children away from those of his concubines who he cannot officially recognise as wives.

Aminat Akhmadova gave birth to Ramzan Kadyrov’s son Sheikh-Muhammad in 2014 . Proekt knows this on the basis of documentary and verbal confirmations × . As is customary, Aminat was provided with a separate house in a specially protected area near Kadyrov’s residence, where she lives with her servants and, at least occasionally, with her son. However, the child is presented in public as the son of Kadyrov’s legal wife Medni. 

This is a drama for the kids. Take Kadyrov’s second eldest son Eli, for example. Eli’s mother is Fatima Khazuyeva, one of the Chechen ruler’s unofficial wives.

Fatima is also the mother of Ramzan’s three other children. Here is her daughter Ashura hugging her fake mother Medni Kadyrova in this family photo.

And these are Eset and Sheikh-Ahmad, the twins Fatima gave birth to in 2015.

Our interlocutor recalls witnessing a family drama – Fatima wanted to hug one of her children when she came to Ramzan’s house. But the father strictly forbade it. 

The circumstances under which Ramzan took Fatima as his wife are worthy of a separate story. Khazuyeva came second in the only beauty contest in Chechen history, which took place in the spring of 2006. The contest was essentially held just for Ramzan – there weren’t even any outside spectators. This was explained by concern for morality, but the real reason was simple – Ramzan organised the show exclusively for his women. 

At the time when Khazuyeva received the second prize, she was already carrying Ramzan’s son. Fatima was 14 years old then, still at school. Eli was born at the very end of that year. 

An acquaintance of Ramzan’s tells us: “Kadyrov prefers virgin young girls, schoolgirls or first-year students. He has an assistant who keeps contacts of many young Chechen girls. Dozens, maybe hundreds.”

This is the most horrifying part of the story. People we have spoken to and trust recall that in the noughties Kadyrov “knew no limits” when it came to getting girls, as they put it. Kadyrov’s men would catch beautiful young Chechen girls right on the street, on their way to school. Some of his concubines were forbidden by Kadyrov to even think of having a child from him. Any disobedience was inevitably punished. 

This is what happened to Zhanetta Mukuyeva. Her story was told to us by three people who knew both Ramzan and the girl’s family. 

Zhanetta is the same age as Ramzan. He had known her since his youth and was probably in love with her. But at a young age Zhanetta married another Chechen man by the name of Timirbulat. In the 90s Timirbulat was on a roll, he was involved in the aviso scam – Chechens called such people “air sellers” . Our account of this family is based on the recollections of two people who knew Zhanetta, her husband and Ramzan Kadyrov × . But the marriage eventually broke up – in the early 2000s, Zhanetta divorced, leaving behind a young daughter named Linda. Ramzan learnt of this and rushed to the object of his long-standing passion. A relationship developed between them, which eventually led to tragedy. 

On 26 September 2003, Zhanetta died in Gudermes. Unknown persons shot her right on the street. The cause of death was given as numerous through bullet wounds to the head and chest. Two people acquainted with Kadyrov believe that Ramzan himself carried out the execution for some offence. According to one of the people who knew him, when Ramzan heard the news of the girl’s death he was overjoyed. The same interlocutor specifies that Zhanetta was carrying a baby at the time of her death. Kadyrov temporarily named one of his petrol stations in Grozny “Zhanetta” after his murdered mistress. “That’s part of his twisted sense of humour,” says one of our interlocutors. 

Another of Kadyrov’s secret wives and the heroine of the very same song is Khutmat Dadayeva.

Her real name is Zalina. She was also punished for disobeying the sultan in some way, albeit not physically, but career-wise. At first, the young girl would regularly appear in the news alongside Ramzan as his assistant, supervising the Iman women’s club (figuratively speaking, this is an association of female supporters of Kadyrov) and youth policy in the republic. Up to a certain point, Kadyrov would regularly hold meetings with this club and publicly congratulate his assistant on her birthdays, wishing her ‘happiness in her personal life’, but after 2017 he stopped meeting with Dadayeva and demoted her.

Singer Tamila Sagaipova, who wrote the tender song about Kadyrov’s harem, was also punished. Already after meeting Ramzan, the girl had found a close friend, which angered the sultan. Tamila was beaten , according to her acquaintance × . She was promptly removed from the Chechen pop scene, and even videos of her songs were removed from the Internet. Now she lives abroad , according to her social networks. Tamila refused to talk to Proekt, as did the other women mentioned above × .

Meanwhile, Kadyrov showers the obedient wives with money. For a while they were all housed in one of the new apartment blocks in the centre of Grozny. Then many of them were given expensive houses in the most protected district of the Chechen capital, just behind Ramzan’s residence. Here, by the way, is Fatima Khazueva’s house. 

It is now clear where Ramzan Kadyrov spends the billions stolen from the budget through Benofon and other companies like it. And in his spare time, the sultan likes to take his harem to Dubai. There, according to an eyewitness, Kadyrov’s concubines play Mafia Russian social deduction game × with their Nanak.

Apart from money, status is also important. It is honourable to be the mother of an heir to the sultan of Chechnya, even if you cannot declare motherhood publicly… For example, it is honourable to be the mother of Adam Kadyrov, the brutal 15-year-old prince.

Let’s go back to that beauty pageant. There’s a reason we said it was a show organised exclusively for Ramzan Kadyrov’s women. If Fatima Khazueva came second, then who took first place? That girl, now a thirty-two-year-old woman, is called Zamira (aka Indira) Dzhabrailova.

In the days of the contest Zamira was 14 years old, she grew up without a father – he fell in the war. Just a year and a half later, Zamira gave birth to Adam Kadyrov , according to three people familiar with the Chechen leader’s family × … Who, from the first days, will be presented as the son of another woman. 

Could this family secret be the reason for Adam’s abnormal cruelty? Maybe. All the Kadyrovs had complicated family conflicts. But there’s something else terrifying about Adam Kadyrov’s story.

In 2022, two of the young prince’s cronies passed away in Chechnya under strange circumstances. The first was Abdulkerim Edilov, a professional MMA fighter who trained Kadyrov’s sons, for which he received the post of Chechnya’s deputy prime minister. Here is Edilov in training with Ramzan Kadyrov himself.

Not long before, Kadyrov had publicly congratulated Edilov on his birthday: “My best friend! Long live Russia! Long live Chechnya! Long live Abdulkerim Edilov!” It seemed like a strong friendship between two tough people, two sportsmen. And suddenly, in November 2022, Edilov disappeared from sight. The Chechen media sparingly wrote that the deputy prime minister had “resigned of his own accord”. And soon after, the 31-year-old Edilov died, but this was only reported by opposition Telegram channels. We have confirmed that Edilov is indeed no longer alive. It is quite telling that neither Ramzan Kadyrov nor the Chechen prime minister said a single word publicly about the death of their friend and colleague. Even the Chechen media seemed not to have noticed Edilov’s death . Some time later, Telegram channels published what were probably staged photographs taken shortly before his death, showing Edilov in the ward of the AyMed clinic belonging to the Kadyrov family × .

The second mysteriously deceased close associate of Adam Kadyrov is his bodyguard Murat Agmerzoyev, known under the callsign Bars. Together with Edilov he accompanied the Chechen prince on his trip to Urus-Martan.

Agmerzoyev is a relatively well-known man, he held the unofficial title of “the fastest gun in Chechnya” and worked as an instructor at the Special Forces University, which now bears Vladimir Putin’s name. Two of Proekt’s sources confirmed that Agmerzoyev is dead.

What caused the sudden deaths of these two young tough men? Several people we spoke to are convinced that Ramzan Kadyrov punished them for something. But for what? The thing is that in late 2022, rumours denigrating the Kadyrov family began to spread on the Chechen internet (primarily in numerous Whatsapp groups and opposition Telegram channels). 

Some claimed that Edilov and Agmerzoyev had allegedly overlooked Adam Kadyrov’s drug addiction, which led to a serious car crash in which innocent people were killed. Others were discussing the version that the guards and Kadyrov’s son allegedly turned out to be gay. Both of these claims are impossible to verify, and we are not interested in people’s personal preferences. But another thing is important here. Popular rumour is a very important part of everyday life in Chechnya. This poor publicity undermined the reputation of the Kadyrov family, because the sultan himself persecutes both homosexuals and drug addicts. 

Anyway, soon after these rumours appeared, Edilov and Agmerzoyev bit the dust, and young Adam Kadyrov was showered with awards.

The Executioner

Some might say that how Kadyrov raises his children, how many wives and Mercedes cars he has, is his personal business. What matters is that no more Russian soldiers are being killed in Chechnya. This is a debatable statement – there has indeed been no active fighting in Chechnya for a long time, but the main credit for this goes to the Russian army itself, and not to the puppet regime chosen by the Kremlin in the flat of a criminal mastermind.

But murders of Russian citizens continue and have long been taking place far beyond the borders of Chechnya itself – in Moscow and even abroad. Earlier in this film you have already heard the stories of some of the mysterious murders that have accompanied Kadyrov’s career.

In all cases, they either went uninvestigated or the investigation preferred not even to touch on the possible involvement of Ramzan Kadyrov in these crimes. There were always “convenient” people to blame – either militants or Chechen bandits. 

Now we are going to give you some unique details which prove that Ramzan Kadyrov and his closest associates were probably involved in at least some of these murders.

But first let us introduce three important participants in this story, who we will keep mentioning later – they are Kadyrov’s main accomplices in dirty deeds, and probably the only non-relatives of Ramzan in the Chechen top brass.

Magomed (Timur by passport) Daudov, who is more commonly known in Chechnya by his call sign Lord. He is now Chechnya’s prime minister, the second man in the local power vertical. At the beginning of the second Chechen war, young Daudov fought against the federals near Kurchaloy in the detachment of a field commander nicknamed Khozhik. During one of the battles, the Kadyrovites captured Daudov and brought him to Ramzan in the trunk of Lada Samara , the above facts about Daudov are based on the account of a former field commander who knew him and are partly confirmed by public data × . Daudov swore allegiance to the new master and since then has been carrying out many dirty assignments of his boss. As an acquaintance of Ramzan’s explains, Daudov is responsible for repression inside Chechnya, for example, it was he who led the campaign of intimidation and murder of Chechen gays.

And this is Adam Delimkhanov, whose nicknames themselves describe Chechnya’s recent history. In the 90s, when the First Chechen War was going on, Delimkhanov was the personal driver of field commander Salman Raduyev. He used to drive Raduyev to his mistress, who later turned him over to the feds – this story was spread by many Chechen field commanders. Two of them relayed it to us × . For this Delimkhanov was nicknamed Coachman. When the war ended with the militants’ victory, Delimkhanov turned to trading in scrap metal, which was then plentiful in Grozny. With the outbreak of the Second Chechen War, Adam joined Kadyrov’s ranks. In the Chechen top brass he is responsible for dirty business outside the republic, primarily in Moscow. Delimkhanov is also in charge of hostile takeovers in Kadyrov’s interests – his men use threats and force to seize businesses all over Russia. For many years the Chechens frighteningly referred to Delimkhanov as simply Adam – it was clear to everyone who they were talking about. But there has been a change recently – Ramzan’s heir, the son of Zamira Dzhabrailova, has grown up. Now only he can claim to be the only Adam in Chechnya. That is why people in Ramzan Kadyrov’s court now call Delimkhanov White Beard , according to an acquaintance of Kadyrov’s × . But still do it with fear.

The third of Ramzan’s cronies is also involved in dirty business. It’s Suleiman Geremeyev, Adam Delimkhanov’s cousin. Although he served in the Chechen security services, he has always spent most of his time in Moscow, where he oversees hostile takeovers, debt collection and contract killings. Geremeyev’s base is the President Hotel on Yakimanka Street, where rooms for Chechen fighters are paid for from the republican budget. After one of the assassinations that took place in Moscow, which we will describe later, Geremeyev was urgently made a senator in order to receive legal immunity. Geremeyev has a whole family of criminals around him – his nephews Ruslan and Artur are also involved in his affairs.

It was a shock. Shot 100 metres from the Kremlin that night was not just a man I knew personally. He was the most prominent opposition figure in Russia, and at the time probably the only politician who could challenge Putin in the elections.

Nemtsov was planning to run in the 2018 presidential election , a person from his inner circle recalls × . So it was obvious from the very beginning that the murder was politically motivated. It was also obvious because Kadyrov had long had a personal dislike for Nemtsov. On one occasion – back in 2002 – Kadyrov personally threatened Nemtsov with death , Nemtsov himself described this incident in his book Confessions of a Rebel × .

But the Kremlin and the Russian security services, as usual, did everything they could to get Kadyrov and his men off the hook. This is probably because the FSB itself was much closer to the execution of Nemtsov than has hitherto been known. 

This is the morning of the day Nemtsov would be killed. The entrance to an apartment block on Veernaya Street in the west of Moscow. Prominent Chechens – including Kadyrov himself – own flats in several buildings here. In one of these flats, where Ruslan Geremeyev lived, Nemtsov’s killers met that day:

Here, for example, is Beslan Shavanov, who would later be killed during arrest. And next to him is an unknown man in a cap, blue jacket and jeans, with a handbag on his shoulder. 

And this is the entrance of another apartment block on Veernaya Street, where other members of the group lived, just an hour after Nemtsov’s murder. Anzor Gubashev, Zaur Dadayev and Ruslan Mukhudinov are coming out of the building. Wait, look, behind the Nemtsov killers comes the same unknown man who accompanied another participant in the Nemtsov murder in the morning.

And this is once again the first house on Veernaya Street – we’ve got a full-on bingo here. On this video are all participants of Nemtsov’s murder and the same unknown man with a handbag.

One last video. This is 28 February, one day after Nemtsov’s murder. There are increased patrols in Moscow, the police are looking for the killers and everyone who was involved in the crime is trying to leave the city urgently. What’s going on in this video? 

That’s Artur Geremeyev, Ruslan Geremeyev’s brother. He comes out of the apartment block on Veernaya Street with his belongings, and the same unknown person helps Geremeyev get into the car. After that Artur Geremeyev left for Chechnya, in other words, he hid from the investigation. In the end, he was not even questioned. 

You may ask where we got these videos. But they are not classified, they are part of the criminal case of Nemtsov’s murder – they were studied by the investigation. There is a reason why all of the men in these videos were among the suspects… except for one. This man here, in a jacket and with a handbag on his shoulder. Strange, he spent almost the whole day of the crime together with the killers, then helped one of the likely masterminds of the murder to escape to Chechnya. And the investigation doesn’t even know his name! Despite the fact that the lawyers of Nemtsov’s daughter repeatedly demanded from the court to find this man, whoever he was. The Criminal Investigation Department failed to do so. But we found him.

First clue: in the case file there is a transcript of the interrogation of a girl who regularly cleaned the flat on Veernaya Street, where the killers lived. She knows this man, so he was obviously a frequent visitor. She gave his name – Dzhabrail’ (his name is mentioned in the case with the soft L). 

The second clue is that the case file contains billing data (i.e. data on calls from mobile numbers) of the participants in Nemtsov’s assassination. Having compared the time of the calls and the times these people got caught on CCTV cameras, we easily deduced the phone number of this unknown person named Dzhabrail’. Why the investigators couldn’t do it is a good question. We’ll answer this question shortly.

The number we found is saved by other subscribers as Dzhabrail Eldarov , according to the Getcontact app × . This is a real person, one of the witnesses or even a likely accomplice to the murder, whom law enforcers simply did not look for. What do we know about Dzhabrail Eldarov? He appeared in old Moscow police databases as a “criminal element,” but there is no information about his criminal record.

It’s possible Eldarov has a serious cover. We know for sure that he is related to Vaittsy Talarov, a prominent Chechen gangster. Talarov was related to the Lazania gang and was one of its leaders. In recent years, after former Lazania gang leaders had died or disappeared, it effectively became Kadyrov’s subcontractor. It was from among its fighters that the perpetrators of many of Kadyrov’s crimes were selected.  On the other hand, Dzhabrail Eldarov has long been linked to the Kadyrovs – in one of the old criminal cases there is an interrogation of his relative where she says that Eldarov supplied the Kadyrovs with weapons as far back as 2003. And Dzhabrail’s brother Dzhalaudi served with Kadyrov in battalion “South” and was even awarded a medal. 

During the period of following Nemtsov and the first days after his murder, Dzhabrail Eldarov called all the other accomplices 754 times! He had many long conversations with Zaur Dadayev and Anzor Gubashev, the immediate perpetrators of the murder, as well as with Ruslan Mukhudinov, who the investigation named as the one who organised the assassination attempt, and finally, he talked a lot with Ruslan Geremeyev, whom the lawyers of Boris Nemtsov’s daughter believe to be the actual mastermind of the murder. The last known call that Eldarov received was on 1 March 2015 from Artur Geremeyev, who they had fled Moscow together with to escape the investigation.  Think about it, 754 times – what did they talk about? The weather? If the billing data isn’t enough evidence for you, we have something more tangible. Here are photos from the phones of Zaur Dadayev and Tamerlan Eskerkhanov, convicted of murdering Nemtsov. For example, this one was taken on 10 February 2015, a couple of weeks before the murder.

The photo shows Dadayev, Eskerkhanov and the same Dzhabrail Eldarov. The Chechens took a photo at a petrol station for some reason, which allows us to see one more piece of evidence – behind them is a Mercedes ML-300 with the number plate A007AR199. This car was used by Ruslan Geremeyev, Kadyrov’s closest friend, to travel around Moscow. 

We were able to contact a relative of Eldarov. He claims that Dzhabrail was not involved in the murder, despite knowing all the participants. According to the relative, Eldarov was engaged in debt collection in Moscow and simply occasionally stayed in the same flat as the murderers. Eldarov himself refused to speak to Proekt. 

In short, the case of Nemtsov’s murder is literally filled with evidence indicating that at least one more person could have been involved in it. There are videos, there is a witness, there is a phone number. But the investigation is not interested in any of this. And we have a guess as to why that is. Vadim Prokhorov, the lawyer of Nemtsov’s daughter, says that during the trial he received information that Dzhabrail is connected to the FSB and that is why the court does not reveal his identity. In reality, this situation may be even more suspicious. 

The thing is that Dzhabrail Eldarov was married to Laisen Iskuzhina, aka Elena, aka Amina Shishkina , as Proekt knows × . It is rare for a woman to change her first and last names as often as Laisen. A possible explanation for this behaviour is that Laisen is the daughter of Rudik Iskuzhin, a veteran of the Soviet security services and a buddy of Putin’s from the KGB – they studied together at the KGB Institute in the 80s. Putin has not forgotten his old classmate – Iskuzhin was a senator from Bashkortostan for almost 10 years, a seat he got on the Kremlin’s patronage. At one time they even wanted to appoint him head of Bashkortostan, but something didn’t work out. 

Here’s one interesting detail: when Eldarov was Iskuzhina’s husband, he also changed his surname. He became Shishkin for a while, taking the surname of one of Leysan Iskuzhina’s previous husbands. We don’t know why he did this, but one thing is clear: one of the likely accomplices in the Nemtsov murder really doesn’t want to be identified.

Eldarov is not the only Chechen militant whom the investigation has chosen not to bother. This is Aslambek Khatayev, who officially worked as a police inspector in Chechnya and was a subordinate of one of the Geremeyev brothers.  In truth, he is Adam Delimkhanov’s bodyguard and his nominee (in particular, the Moscow flat of the Delimkhanov family was registered in his name , according to the Rosreestr data × . Khatayev helped Nemtsov’s killers in renting a flat in Moscow, and he also talked on the phone a lot with the perpetrators of the crime. After the murder, he booked tickets for Ruslan Geremeyev so that he could escape to Chechnya . Ruslan would only be “found” years later – as the commander of the Chechen unit that captured the Ukrainian city of Mariupol. After being wounded, Ruslan was visited in hospital by Ramzan Kadyrov and Adam Delimkhanov × . 

At first the investigation took an interest in Khatayev, but then simply excluded him from the list of suspects. Khatayev was interrogated in Chechnya by local security forces under Kadyrov’s control, and that was the end of it. For the sake of further protection Khatayev moved to Dzhalka , according to the interrogation transcript and Numbuster app data on Khatayev’s phone number × , the ancestral village of Adam Delimkhanov. Compare this with the recent arrests and crackdown in the case of the Crocus City Hall shooting, where even those who sold a car to the terrorists were harshly detained. 

Let’s summarise. Firstly, a man linked to Kadyrov and Putin’s entourage was probably involved in the murder of Boris Nemtsov. Despite the evidence, no one has searched for this man. Secondly, the same group of Nemtsov’s killers probably included a personal assistant of Adam Delimkhanov, formerly known as Coachman, a specialist in dirty deeds under Ramzan Kadyrov. This figure was simply excluded from the list of suspects.                   

However, that’s still not all. Among the people who probably had something to do with Nemtsov’s murder and who had been excluded from the investigation was another person whose identity will tell us a great deal about the impunity of Kadyrov and his men. To tell his story, we need to go back to 2004. At that time, Yakov Sergunin, former deputy prime minister of Chechnya, and Paul Khlebnikov, editor-in-chief of the Forbes magazine and a US citizen, were murdered in Moscow.

Sergunin and his wife were shot on 25 June 2004 in a car on Pokrovka Street in the centre of the capital. The woman survived, while her husband died on the spot. Exactly two weeks later, Paul Khlebnikov was shot dead near his editorial office in the north of Moscow. Remember, we mentioned his name when we told you that he managed to interview Ichkerian leader Aslan Maskhadov right in the middle of the war in Chechnya. 

Khlebnikov was a Russian-American, and in addition to running the Forbes magazine, he was very interested in Chechnya. A year before the murders, he published a book about the Chechen mafia leader Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev, the same man who headed the Lazania gang, which was closely linked to the FSB and later to Kadyrov. The investigation named Nukhayev as the person who ordered the murders, which in a sense was very convenient for the authorities. Nukhayev went into hiding somewhere abroad and since then nothing has been heard of him; he is probably not even alive anymore . Nukhayev is still on the federal and international Interpol wanted list × . No one has investigated Kadyrov’s involvement in these crimes, and they should.

As in the case of Nemtsov, Kadyrov had motives for wanting Khlebnikov and Sergunin dead. According to family members and colleagues, Paul began gathering material for a book about the theft of federal money in Chechnya (by now you know that Ramzan Kadyrov is personally involved in this). Sergunin was one of Khlebnikov’s sources – he promised to hand over a briefcase with documents to the journalist in the next few days but didn’t manage to do it.  

As in the Nemtsov case, the direct perpetrators of the crime were found quite quickly. Here is the man who shot Sergunin and Khlebnikov. His name is Kazbek Dukuzov. 

During the first trial, the jury acquitted Dukuzov and while a new trial was being scheduled, he managed to escape. In 2011, Dukuzov was detained in the United Arab Emirates and jailed for an offence committed in that country. Moscow sought his extradition to Russia – seemingly to punish him for his crimes in our country, in particular the murder of Khlebnikov. But instead of being transferred under guard, Dukuzov was amnestied and flown by private plane to Chechnya, where he disappeared again . According to the Interior Ministry’s public database, Dukuzov is still on the federal wanted list × . His exact whereabouts are now unknown, but there is an important piece of evidence. In 2021, the Turkish authorities charged Dukuzov and Adam Delimkhanov in absentia with planning assassination attempts on Chechen oppositionists who had settled in Istanbul. In other words, the main perpetrator of Khlebnikov’s murder is also Delimkhanov’s man and appears to be at large now.

But there is something even more to it than that. We have discovered that the Nemtsov and Khlebnikov murders are linked, and that this link once again extends to Kadyrov. Look, this is Magomed Edilsultanov. In the past, he was also a member of the Chechen gang. 

In 2004, investigators deemed that Edilsultanov was one of the intermediaries in organising the murder of Sergunin and Khlebnikov , according to the case files we have studied and confirmed by the words of Paul Khlebnikov’s relatives × . He was put on the wanted list, but never found. In 2010, as the investigation reported, Edilsultanov himself appeared before the authorities, gave testimony and the charges against him were dropped. Apparently, this can happen too. A man hid from the police for 5 years and only then realised that he was not guilty of anything. 

Another five years passed and Edilsultanov was back in business. From October 2014, when the assassins started following Nemtsov, until 1 March, when they went into hiding, Edilsultanov made 391 phone calls to the participants in the assassination , as above, the billing data was obtained from the Nemtsov murder case files × . What did they discuss? The weather again? Edilsultanov’s name is never mentioned in the case, it’s as if he didn’t exist. Once again, we have an explanation as to why this happened.

In this photo, you can see our man together with his brother Isa. Isa worked as Ramzan Kadyrov’s envoy to the Ivanovo Oblast . Since August 2020, Isa Edilsultanov is being held in the Ivanovo pre-trial detention centre as a suspect in fraud and creation of a criminal network × .  

And here is another photo – it shows Khamzat Ustarkhanov, Magomed Edilsultanov’s nephew. He is another boxing coach of Adam Kadyrov. 

And this is Magomed Edilsultanov himself. But who is he with? That’s Adam “White Beard” Delimkhanov, who, according to one of our sources, is a distant relative of his. And where are they? This photo was taken in the luxurious Zabeel Saray complex in the UAE, where Ramzan Kadyrov’s foreign home is located. Edilsultanov has a lot of photos taken there. Here he is, for example, with boxer Mike Tyson.

Let us summarise. Three of the most notorious political murders of the Putin era are at the very least under-investigated, and at the very most Kadyrov’s involvement in them has been concealed. And there have been many other political murders in which Kadyrov’s involvement is at least probable.

Политические убийств, к которым мог быть причастен Кадыров

Anna Politkovskaya.  Novaya Gazeta journalist and human rights activist. She wrote critical articles about Ramzan Kadyrov. Killed on 7 October 2006 in the lift of her home in Moscow. Members of both law enforcement agencies and the Lazania gang were involved in the murder.

Movladi Baisarov. Former bodyguard of Akhmat Kadyrov, commander of the “Gorets” detachment, FSB colonel. On 18 November 2006, he was killed on Leninsky Prospekt in Moscow by Ramzan Kadyrov’s subordinates, with Adam Delimkhanov shooting him in the head. According to the official version, Baisarov resisted an attempt to arrest him by Chechen police.

Natalia Estemirova.  Employee of the Memorial human rights centre. Defended victims of the Kadyrov regime. She was abducted on 15 July 2009 near her home in Grozny. The same day her body was found in Ingushetia with gunshot wounds.

Yuri Budanov. Former commander of a tank regiment who was convicted of the kidnapping and murder of Chechen girl Elza Kungayeva in 2000. On 10 June 2011, he was shot dead in Moscow. According to Rosbalt, the killer, Yusup-Khadzhi Temirkhanov, was a “good acquaintance” of Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev, leader of the Lazania gang.

Umar Israilov. A former member of Ramzan Kadyrov’s security detail who fled to Europe. On 13 January 2009 he was killed in Vienna (Austria) during an attempt to kidnap him and bring him to Chechnya.

We could end our account of Kadyrov’s brutality and impunity here. But there is one more story we must tell you. Several times throughout the film we mentioned the Yamadayev family, the former field commanders who at the beginning of the Second Chechen War defected to Moscow and helped a great deal in the fight against the militants. As you may remember, it was the Yamadayevs who gave Ramzan his first automatic rifle and his first foreign car. When Kadyrov began his rise to the top, the Yamadayevs were already probably the most influential family in Chechnya; one of the brothers, Ruslan, had become a member of the State Duma, while the other, Sulim, was a lieutenant colonel of the GRU with a battalion of fighters under his command. Many in Chechnya believed that it was Ruslan Yamadayev who should have become president after the death of Akhmad Kadyrov. Of course, Ramzan could not tolerate such influential Chechens around him. The way he dealt with the Yamadayevs says a lot about the relationship between Kadyrov and the Kremlin. 

Ramzan became the rightful president of Chechnya in 2007. At that time there was also a transfer of power in Moscow – Dmitry Medvedev was preparing to become president (albeit a decorative one).  Unlike Putin, Ramzan always treated Medvedev with a smirk, says an acquaintance of Kadyrov’s. He would carry this attitude through the years.  Taking advantage of Medvedev’s weakness, Kadyrov solved all his problems. Events developed rapidly.

In January 2008, a private meeting with Medvedev, who was about to be elected president, was arranged for Sulim Yamadayev , a relative of his recalls × . Yamadaev was hoping to enlist Moscow’s support in his confrontation with Kadyrov. This was in Voronezh, where Medvedev had come with a group of generals. But a rather absurd event happened there. Sulim Yamadayev overslept and did not attend the meeting. Since the First Chechen War, when Chechens hid from air raids in the sunlight, Sulim Yamadayev would sleep during the day and stay awake at night. That’s how he overslept. Medvedev was furious and turned in the whole clan without much hesitation.

In September 2008 Ruslan Yamadayev, who had recently resigned as a State Duma member, was shot dead in Moscow right in front of the House of the Government. Chechen executioners seem to love such symbolism – Nemtsov was killed near the Kremlin. Yamadayev’s killer was Aslanbek Dadayev, another former member of the Lazania gang who had a history of murders in Moscow. He was famous in criminal circles for committing murders right on the road, approaching the target on a motorbike or in a car – this detail was recalled by one of our interlocutors, who was well acquainted with the circumstances of the case × . For the murder of Ruslan Yamadayev, he received a flat on Leninsky Prospekt and a bag of money from Adam Delimkhanov , Proekt knows this from the words our source and early media reports × , but this connection was never looked into by the investigation. Dadayev was sentenced to 20 years in a strict regime penal colony, but has actually long been at large in Chechnya. According to leaks, Dadayev has long been at large. Suleiman Geremeyev, who was questioned as the likely mastermind of the murder, also went unpunished. To ensure Geremeyev’s immunity, Kadyrov ordered Senator Umar Dzhabrailov to immediately resign as a member of the Federation Council. The free mandate was handed over to Geremeyev, who still has a seat in the upper house of the Russian parliament today.

Only six months after Ruslan’s murder, the second most influential Yamadayev, Sulim, was shot dead in broad daylight in the UAE. The killer was another Chechen bandit, Zelimkhan Mazayev, and among the accomplices was Ramzan Kadyrov’s personal stableboy. The day before the murder, Delimkhanov had travelled to Dubai to coordinate the assassination attempt. But more importantly, the weapons used to kill Yamadayev were smuggled into the UAE with Kadyrov’s help and the patronage of the Russian state. Three pistols inlaid with gold were brought to the UAE as diplomatic cargo under the guise of a gift. The handle of the gun used to shoot Sulim had an inlaid portrait of King Abdullah of Jordan. The killer simply dumped the gun, which was 70% gold, in the same car park where he shot Yamadayev. This time, it would have been too difficult to overlook the involvement of the Chechen leadership in the murder. That’s why Delimkhanov was briefly put on the international wanted list. No one was looking for him in Russia though, he continued to work as a member of the State Duma, just like Geremeyev works as a senator. Soon all charges (even formal ones) against him were dropped, and all the perpetrators of the crime were released. The murderer, Zelimkhan Mazayev, was later arrested in Moscow for another offence, but the Russian investigation did not even mention his involvement in Yamadayev’s murder. 

The above story is doubly important if we remember that both of the murdered Yamadayevs held the title of Heroes of Russia. That is, the holders of the country’s highest state honour were defiantly killed by another Hero of Russia, to whom the state did nothing for this.

The three surviving Yamadayev brothers have been scattered around the world ever since. One of them told us through an acquaintance: “All his life Ramzan dreamed of becoming scary. Nobody respected him. And in Chechnya, without authority, you are just a nobody.”

Epilogue

Even in Putin’s Russia, there are times when the president punishes top officials for murder, ties to the criminal world, corruption, theft and the ostentatious wealth in which they live.  As you can see, none of this applies to Ramzan Kadyrov. His criminal activities are plain to see, yet nothing is being done to him. If you count back from the suspicious death of his father in 2004, Kadyrov Jr. has been running his region for 20 years, longer than any other governor in Russia. Putin has met with this criminal at least 30 times over the years, and almost every time Kadyrov would post a picture like this, or this, or this, or this, following the talks. 

Judging by these photos, the two men are happy with each other. We once asked a senior Russian official what the secret of Kadyrov’s immunity was. “Subdued Chechnya is the basis of Putin’s power, that’s how he himself became president. If we recognise that the leader of subjugated Chechnya turned out to be a scoundrel, what will be left of Putin himself?”

Editing – Roman Badanin
Fact checking – Mikhail Rubin, Vitaly Soldatskikh, Ekaterina Reznikova
Translation – Sergei Grishechkin

There was an error in the film – we referred to a photograph that Chechen bloggers mistakenly presented as a photograph of the execution of Akhmed Israpilov. We apologize to the viewers.