Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

21 мая 2026 г.

Petr Pogibin

How high-profile fugitives from Ukraine have settled in Russia. The most prominent of them, of course, is Viktor Medvedchuk. Our project has discovered that he owns a personal oil refinery.

Its revenue and profits fell significantly after several drone strikes, but last year the refinery purchased new capacity. However, problems arose with this new capacity.

Other co-owners are also interesting. They include Putin’s classmate, the right-hand man of the bloody organized crime group leader Dzhako, and an associate of the son of the first deputy head of the GRU.

Pervy Zavod LLC in the village of Polotnyany Zavod in the Kaluga Region processes commercial oil and gas condensate. Before the war, the plant was scheduled to be modernized to produce Euro 5 fuel. It is the largest enterprise in the region: in the pre-war 2021 year, its revenue was 38.3 billion rubles.

Our project has discovered that Marina Bochareva, director and co-owner of the Kaluga oil refinery, is no ordinary manager; the person behind her is Viktor Medvedchuk. Bochkareva previously worked for him, under her former name, Dukhovnikova. In 2018-19, she was the director of Yug Energo LLC in the Rostov Region. At that time, the founders of this company were two offshore companies: Ventolor Investments Limited and Tumillon Investments Ltd. Both were owned by Ukrainian TV presenter Oksana Marchenko, the wife of Viktor Medvedchuk.

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

Sources at the Cheka-OGPU and Rucriminal.info also name Putin’s classmate and brother-in-law, Viktor Khmarin, as co-owners of the plant, as well as... Arkady Berkovich (Artur Khabibullin). He was the "right-hand man" of the leader of the most violent organized crime group, Aslan Gagiev (Dzhako), and at the time, the common-law husband of Svetlana Radionova, a then-prosecutor’s office employee and now head of Rosprirodnadzor. In 2006, Berkovich managed to obtain a genuine death certificate in Dagestan and went deep into hiding. However, in 2015, he flew to Russia and was arrested on charges of murdering three bankers. Thanks to the efforts of his patrons, including Radionova, Berkovich was mysteriously placed under house arrest. Meanwhile, he was regularly seen in restaurants on Rublyovka. Then he disappeared again. His patrons arranged for him to travel abroad. However, he has now resurfaced in Russia. How this happened, despite being accused of three murders, and under what new name, remains a mystery.

There are no random people among the co-owners of the Kaluga plant. Among them, Tea Kobulashvili. Her stake in the company once amounted to 95% (2016-17), but gradually declined – first to 90%, then to 50% (2022-2023), and in 2023 to 12%, ending up as collateral for VEB. Kobulashvili has no other business in Russia, but she has a wealthy background and a relative and fellow Russian, Koba Tskhadaiia. According to leaked data, they previously shared an email address and traveled together from Moscow on vacation.

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

Koba Tskhadaiia ran a business in the 2000s with the notorious criminal figure Jorge Portilla-Sumin (aka Georgiy Panish). In the late 1980s, Portilla-Sumin received a 14-year prison sentence for the murder of his stepfather and housekeeper, serving his sentence in Georgia. There, he became involved with the thief-in-law Jaba Ioseliani and his friend Tengiz Kitovani—well-known figures in Georgia in the 1990s and 2000s. It is believed that after this, Jorge represented the interests of Georgian criminals in the US and Russia. Last year, in Russia, Portilla-Sumin was sentenced in absentia to 15 years for embezzlement from the Klimovsky Specialized Cartridge Plant—in absentia because, of course, they couldn’t find him.

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

According to leaked data, in 2016, Tea Kobulashvili was both the founder of Perviy Zavod and an employee of NEFTEGAZ LEASING LLC (now called NGL), which belonged to the Luxembourg-based company INTERNATIONAL HOLDING AND FINANCING S.A. At that time, the company was generating revenue of 300-360 million rubles annually, but was reporting losses to Russian tax authorities. Beginning in 2022, its revenue suddenly skyrocketed, reaching 3.4 billion rubles by the end of 2025.

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

The Luxembourg-based company INTERNATIONAL HOLDING AND FINANCING S.A. was managed by the British-based Global Equity Investment Ltd., whose controlling person was Maka Asatiani, a 52-year-old Georgian-Swiss citizen. She is a renowned Georgian designer and the mother of businessman Kakha Zhordania, who runs an oil business in Russia with a very interesting business partner. Currently, Kakha owns 25% of the Russian oil trader SDO-Logistic, while 51% is owned by Sergey Alekseyev, the son of the first deputy head of the GRU, Lieutenant General Vladimir Alekseyev (he was shot in February of this year). Asatiani’s first husband, Kakha Zhordania’s father, is former football player Merab Zhordania. Former footballer and current President of Georgia Mikheil Kavelashvili played for his team. The elder Zhordania has many high-profile friends in Russia, one of whom is Roman Abramovich.

Meanwhile, Georgian businesswoman Maka Asatiani has a second husband, Konstantin (Kote) Gogelia, a well-known businessman in Russia. Until the spring of 2024, he directly owned a stake in KMK LLC, a subsidiary of Perviy Zavod. This subsidiary recently went bankrupt in a rather strange way.

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

Gogelia, like Portilla-Sumin, also "worked" in the 1990s for the crime boss Jaba Ioseliani and his paramilitary unit, the Mkhedrioni. It is believed that Gogelia oversaw a large oil depot in Georgia during that time, which ultimately burned down, and the loss of major assets was blamed on the fire. After moving to Russia, Gogelia became part of the inner circle of then-Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov and, with his help, acquired a refueling base for ships of the Russian Navy’s Northern Fleet—an oil transshipment terminal in the village of Mokhnatkina Pakhta in the Murmansk region—for his company, Kommandit Service (which he owned through the Swiss company Progetra). In the 2000s, Gogelia traded Sibneft oil, and his Northern Freight Company (SGC) had a direct contract with Gazpromtrans. Incidentally, Tea Kobulashvili was also employed by SGC in the 2000s.

As for the Kaluga "international" refinery, it has been in serious trouble since 2022. The plant was repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian drones, resulting in production cuts and repairs that reduced the entire Kaluga Region’s production figures by 2023. Meanwhile, the First Plant accounts for over 50% of the region’s shipped products. Khmarin-Medvedchuk-Gogelia were forced to abandon an agreement with the Russian Ministry of Energy to modernize oil refining facilities and a court-ordered permit to expand production (local residents objected, as the refinery is located 200 meters from a school).

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

Although Perviy Zavod announced last spring that it was launching some kind of upgraded production facility, the equipment, according to a source, was delivered in defiance of sanctions with the help of Berkovich, but it was never fully operational.

KMK, a subsidiary of the plant (founded by Konstantin Gogelia), has been in bankruptcy since 2024, with debts exceeding 100 million rubles. Its creditors included Igor Shuvalov’s VEB.RF and the military-owned PSB Bank, but they transferred their debt claims to the shell company Azimut. Following this, in April of this year, KMK and Perviy Zavod reached a settlement with their creditors.

Viktor Medvedchuk’s criminal network: how the fugitive Ukrainian oligarch is dividing the Kaluga oil refinery with “Dzheko” hitmen, thieves-in-law, and relatives from the GRU

The owner and director of Azimut, to which Khmarin-Medvedchuk-Gogeliy’s company owes approximately 60 million rubles, turned out to be Viktor Afanasyev, a 45-year-old Ukrainian native and worker at a Kaluga plant. He is a regular client and debtor of microloan agencies, earning a monthly salary of 35,000-50,000 rubles. Two other companies, Saturn and Energia, were registered in Afanasyev’s name on the same day as Azimut, but they have not yet been publicly disclosed.

The First Plant has another subsidiary, Arktik Bunker LLC. Through this subsidiary, the plant sells its products, specifically by railcar for Transbunker-Novorossiysk LLC.