Liliputins - 443

I was assured by Mr.Putin that there are absolutely no strings attached to my
Panama offshore $2 bln account ... "
Cellist Sergei Roldugin


Liliputins. What, the heck, is this ?
http://www.stihi.ru/2012/08/18/5368




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no strings attached
 
no special demands or limits that you have to accept The donation has no strings attached, so the charity can use the money for whatever purpose it chooses.
Usage notes: sometimes used in the form with string attached (with special demands or limits): Many special offers come with strings attached, so be aware of this before you buy.

See also: attached, string

Cambridge Dictionary of American Idioms Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2003. Reproduced with permission.


no strings attached

Without conditions or restrictions, as in They give each of the children $10,000 a year with no strings attached. This expression dates from the mid-1900s, although string in the sense of "a limitation" has been used since the late 1800s.

See also: attached, string

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.


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Sergei Roldugin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Born
Sergei Pavlovich Roldugin
September 28, 1951 (age 64)
Sakhalin, Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, USSR

Residence
St Petersburg, Russia

Occupation
Cellist

Known for
"Vladimir Putin's best friend", Panama Papers

Spouse(s)
1.Irina Nikitina, 2.Elena Mirtova

Sergei Pavlovich Roldugin born September 28, 1951 Sakhalin[1][2]) is a Russian cellist and businessman, based in St Petersburg.

He was awarded the 1980 Prague Spring International Music Festival Competition's 3rd prize. In 1984 Roldugin was appointed the Kirov Opera Theatre Orchestra's principal cellist. He subsequently held a professorship at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, where he served as the institution's rector from 2002-05. The Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra's Guest Conductor, he has been named a People's Artist of Russia.

Since 1990s, Roldugin was engaged in oil and media business.[3]

Connections with Vladimir Putin and Panama Papers

Sergey Roldugin is a godfather to Maria Putina, Vladimir Putin's daughter.[4] He has been friends with the Putin since the late 1970s.[5] In March 2016 The Guardian described Roldugin as "Putin's best friend". It was Roldugin who introduced Putin to Lyudmila, his future wife. Roldugin's brother Yevgeny was at KGB training school with Putin.[6]

Panama Papers

Main article: Panama Papers

In April 2016 the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project described Roldugin as the "secret caretaker" of Putin's hidden wealth through his participation in transactions between various offshore companies.


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Cellist And Conductor Allegedly Helped Russians Move Billions Of Dollars

April 4, 2016

Anastasia Tsioulcas 



In 2014, Sergei Roldugin told the New York Times, "I don't have millions."

But if the document trail of the Panama Papers proves correct, this Russian cellist and conductor — and a close friend of Vladimir Putin since the 1970s — may actually possess much more than that.

The Two-Way

Here's What You Need To Know (So Far) About 'Panama Papers'
   
According to reporting from the consortium of 370 international journalists from over 100 news organizations working on the data leak of more than 11 million documents in what's become known as the Panama Papers, Roldugin — or at least his name — is at the center of a network in which up to $2 billion from Russian state banks has been hidden in offshore shell companies.

In the wake of this massive document leak, a pair of articles centering on Roldugin have been published by the Guardian in the U.K. and a nonprofit investigative journalism organization based in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina called the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (the OCCRP), which focuses on the regions between Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Off-shore promo

Planet Money

We Set Up An Offshore Company In A Tax Haven
   
In their reports, the Guardian's Luke Harding and three OCCRP journalists, Roman Anin, Olesya Shmagun and Dmitry Velikovksiy, claim that Roldugin — godfather to Putin's first child, Maria Putina — is at the epicenter of the alleged Russian arrangement, whose activities came to light as part of the data dump from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.

The Guardian sets the value of these transactions at $1 billion; the OCCRP journalists mention Roldugin-related deals regarding offshore accounts and state-controlled banks worth at least $2 billion.

Now 64 years old, Roldugin has taken a prominent role in Russian cultural life. According to his biography on the site of the St. Petersburg Music House, a state-sponsored classical music organization whose primary aim is to prepare young musicians for international competition, Roldugin "insisted" on a full restoration of the school's home, the 19th-century Alexis Palace, a former residence of the Russian grand duke Alexei Alexandrovich.
   
A winner of the People's Artist of Russia prize, Roldugin also serves as a juror of the highly prestigious Tchaikovsky Competition for music, and is a former rector of the St. Petersburg State Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory.

In 1984, Roldugin was named as the first soloist and principal cellist of Russia's premier international orchestra, the Mariinsky Orchestra — an organization led by another close artistic ally of Vladimir Putin, Valery Gergiev. Since then, Roldugin has risen to become one of the Mariinsky's guest conductors.