💢 Investigative journalist Sergey Sokolov, former editor-in-chief of Sovershenno Sekretno, on Mikhai

💢 Investigative journalist Sergey Sokolov, former editor-in-chief of Sovershenno Sekretno, on Mikhail Khodorkovsky, YUKOS and the transformation of Russian investigative journalism:

• Sokolov says his early investigations into the so-called Communist Party gold found less of a hidden cash hoard than a system for financing foreign communist parties and movements. Some received cash, while others were supported through commercial schemes. He cites Soviet purchases of Portuguese port wine at inflated prices as one such mechanism.

• He traces Khodorkovsky’s rise to his Communist Party and Komsomol connections. According to Sokolov, the privileges granted to youth scientific and technical centers during perestroika allowed Khodorkovsky’s organization to handle foreign trade and large financial flows, eventually providing the foundation for Menatep and later YUKOS.

• Sokolov says his magazine Kompromat published a dossier on YUKOS in May 2003, shortly before the first arrests in the case. “They were untouchable.” He recalls that YUKOS wielded enormous media influence, including multimillion-dollar advertising contracts with major newspapers.

• He alleges that former KGB general Alexey Kandaurov, then working for Khodorkovsky, offered him $35,000 to buy the magazine’s print run. Sokolov says he later learned Kandaurov was carrying a court order authorizing the issue’s seizure and believes accepting the money could have been used to accuse him of extortion.

• Sokolov says Khodorkovsky and Leonid Nevzlin used the opportunities created by perestroika and privatization to build one of Russia’s largest oil companies, and claims YUKOS was eventually intended for sale to US companies.

• He also describes Khodorkovsky’s later activities in the US and Europe as an extension of the same strategy: hiring professional lobbyists, cultivating political contacts and financing organizations abroad. Sokolov argues that these networks later became involved in lobbying sanctions against Russia.

• On investigative journalism itself, Sokolov says the profession has shifted from cultivating sources and obtaining documents to databases, digital tools and artificial intelligence. But he argues its political role has also sharpened: “Investigative journalism is now a weapon. It can be aimed for or against.”

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