Dezinformatsiya: Is Russia targeting English Courts?
Last week the Commercial Court ordered a US law firm to name the “business intelligence consultancy” which had supplied a document critical to attempts to re-open a dispute between Vladimir Chernukhin and Oleg Deripaska. The so-called “Glavstroy Report” was a feasibility study for the redevelopment of a site in Moscow. Chernukhin introduced it in s.68 proceedings seeking to annul an arbitral award in his favour. He argued that Deripaska should have disclosed the report and that, had he done so, the award would have been $300m larger.
The report turned out to be a forgery. It was supplied by CT Group, Sir Lynton Crosby’s intelligence and PR outfit. It is the third time Crosby’s firm has been caught flogging fake evidence within a year. If these were criminal proceedings, there might now be calls for a review of previous cases in which the same expert’s evidence had been considered. In any event, the case merits further scrutiny.
Despite its track record, it is not claimed that CT Group, like the titular hero and hoover salesman in Graham Greene’s Our Man in Havana, is forging documents to keep clients happy. Rather, in all three cases the material originated in Russia. (In the two previous cases, CT Group said that private bank statements which the Court found to be forgeries had been provided by a Russia-based intelligence operative with backdoor access to the European Central Bank.)
Corporate intelligence firms working on CIS matters have long worked with former members of the Russian security services. They have been no more or less reliable than other sources. Over time, an intelligence firm settles on a number of trusted contacts – having discarded many more.
But times have changed. UK-Russian relations are at their worst since the break-up of the Soviet Union. The head of the UK’s Security Service has warned that Russia is waging a low profile – but multi-faceted and near continuous – campaign to undermine British institutions. Could this campaign extend to undermining the legal system? Russia’s various security agencies will know which of their former colleagues provide information to American and European investigators. Encouraging (or directing) them to supply false documents in big-ticket commercial litigation is a surefire way of making English Courts and English lawyers look wobbly.
Analysis of the three “forged evidence” cases is necessarily speculative. All of the named parties, their lawyers and investigators strongly refute any wrongdoing. But the common factor is clear. So is the lesson to be learned: evidence from Russia or derived from Russian sources requires meticulous scrutiny.
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