Peter Mandelson oligarch Oleg Deripaska linked to mafia boss

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Steven Swinford and Jon Ungoed-Thomas

The Russian oligarch who gave hospitality to Peter Mandelson is this weekend revealed to have been linked to the former boss of one of Russia’s most powerful criminal gangs.

A High Court judgment details the alleged social and business links between Oleg Deripaska and Anton Malevsky, a Russian mobster. Malevsky was then reputedly the head of an organised crime gang and his brother Andrei had a 10% stake in Deripaska’s company.

Deripaska insists that the arrangement with Malevsky was a protection racket that was forced upon him. But a High Court judge, Mr Justice Clarke, said in a preliminary judgment in July that he considers Deripaska may not have always told the full truth about his links to the mobster, who was killed in a freak parachute accident in 2001.
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It is understood that Deripaska does not at present have a visa to visit the UK. This is apparently because he is anxious about being served legal papers relating to the High Court action, in which Michael Cherney, a former business partner of Deripaska, is suing him for £2 billion.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5014782.ece