The publication Proekt found two of Vladimir Putin's female relatives who have luxury real estate registered in their names. Journalists say one of them worked in a managerial position for a pharmaceutical company that won large government contracts.
The Proekt's report identifies Putin's cousin once removedTatiana Ptashuk and her daughter, Yelena Zhidkova. Ptashuk is the daughter of President Putin's cousin Yevgeny Putin and a sibling of Anna Putina-Tsivilyova, who owns the Kolmar coal company and actually runs the Kemerovo Region as the governor's wife.
Tatyana Putina trained as a psychiatrist and married her colleague Anatoly Ptashuk. For many years she worked in the Vladimir region, but she moved to Moscow the year Vladimir Putin was elected president.
From 2004 to 2014, Ptashuk worked as deputy general director of Biotek pharmaceutical company. It was during that period that the company became one of the largest beneficiaries of state drug procurements. At the moment, Ptashuk is employed as deputy head doctor at the President Administration polyclinic in Sivtsev Vrazhek Street in Moscow. Her daughter Elena Zhidkova heads the company Russian Railways Medicine.
Tatyana Ptashuk and her daughter own seven apartments in Moscow, Sochi and Vladimir, four houses and land plots worth over 1.7 billion rubles in total, based on the Rosreestr data. According to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, Ptashuk also owned the company Pliteks together with her brother Mikhail Putin, currently Deputy Chairman of Gazprom. Denis Putin, Mikhail's son, currently owns a stake in Pliteks.
Proekt released several investigations into the corrupt ties of Putin's relatives. In December 2019, Proekt estimated the fortune of Vladimir Putin's nephew Mikhail Shelomov at $1.25 billion. According to the publication, Putin began helping Shelomov in 2002: Igor Sechin, then deputy head of the presidential administration, arranged for him to work at the St. Petersburg branch of the state shipping company Sovkomflot. In 2004, Gazprom sold almost 76% of Sogaz, of which 13.5% was purchased by Shelomov's company Aktsept. A year after, the news appeared that Shelomov owned 3.9% of Bank Rossiya.
In November 2020, Proekt journalists discovered that Svetlana Krivonogikh, a shareholder in Bank Rossiya, was Vladimir Putin's ex-mistress, while her daughter Yelizaveta looked phenomenally like the Russian president.