Here Are The Three Russian Oligarchs Who Have Spoken Out Against The War In Ukraine

Topline

While most of Russia’s billionaires and oligarchs have chosen to remain silent or tacitly support Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, a deluge of Western sanctions against them and the troubled Russian economy has prompted some of them to speak out.

Key Facts

Earlier this week, Russian billionaire and aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska warned that destroying Ukraine would be a “colossal mistake” and questioned if “victory” in the conflict could even be achieved.

Deripaska, who has been hit by a multitude of sanctions from the U.S., U.K., and the European Union, had previously called for “immediate negotiations” between both sides at the start of the invasion.

Just days after Russia’s invasion began in February, Ukraine-born Russian banking tycoon and billionaire Mikhail Fridman spoke out against the war saying it was a “tragedy” for both the Russian and Ukrainian people and called for an end to the “bloodshed.”

In an interview with Bloomberg in March, Fridman said Russian oligarchs had no ability to influence the Russian president and those who urge people like him to pressure Putin “understand nothing about how Russia works.”

While Fridman and Deripaska have been guarded in their criticism—careful not to directly call out Putin—former billionaire and banking tycoon Oleg Tinkov has been much more vocal calling the invasion “crazy.”

Tinkov, who accused the Kremlin of forcing him to sell his stake in Russia’s second-largest bank, said several members of Russia’s business and government elite agreed with him in private but were too scared to speak out publicly.

Big Number

15,000. That is the number of Russian millionaires who have filed migration applications and may be preparing to flee the country the U.K. Defense Ministry said last month in one of its daily intelligence updates. If correct this could be a signal that wealthy Russians’ concerns about the economic fallout of the war may be more widespread than publicly acknowledged.

Tangent

While Russian oligarchs have largely remained silent, the invasion of their country has prompted Ukraine’s billionaires and business elite to set aside their differences with each other and the country’s government to rally around the country’s defense and reconstruction efforts. Earlier this week, Rinat Akhmetov—Ukraine’s richest man with a net worth of $4.6 billion—filed a lawsuit against Russia at the European Court of Human Rights for violating his property rights by targeting steel plants and grain storage facilities owned by him. In March, Akhmetov told Forbes he will help rebuild the devastated port city of Mariupol and the rest of Ukraine after the end of the war regardless of the cost. Ukraine’s former president and chocolate tycoon—who dropped off Forbes’ World’s Billionaires list this year—set aside his differences with political rival Zelensky and even echoed his calls for more military aid to Ukraine. Poroshenko has also called out Putin on several occasions warning that he must not be trusted and has even rejected any compromise that involves Ukraine giving up its territory to Russia.

Further Reading

Billionaire Former F1 Boss Bernie Ecclestone Says He’d ‘Take A Bullet’ For Putin (Forbes)

15,000 Russian Millionaires Are Trying To Exit The Country Amid War In Ukraine, U.K. Says (Forbes)

The Forbes Ultimate Guide To Russian Oligarchs (Forbes)