‘Family is weakness’ Vladimir Putin keeping family details secret for ‘dark reason’

Putin: Analyst says ‘family is weakness’

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Three Russian analysts told CNN that Putin has a number of reasons for keeping his family secret, which all centre around power and money. To the Russian President, they argue, “family is weakness” and cannot be allowed to compromise his image of power and invulnerability. The comments follow news that Britain has joined the US in imposing sanctions on Putin’s two known adult daughters, Katerina Tikhonova and Maria Vorontsova.

One analyst, addressing the footage of Putin talking to film director Oliver Stone about his children, told CNN: “Putin would have looked happier if he were under deposition.

“He’s more interested in appearing with the Russian orthodox church or in military situations or riding shirtless on the back of a horse to project power. Family in many ways is weakness.”

But, the CNN presenter Brian Todd said, there is a “darker reason for keeping his family secret”, citing Professor Howard Stoffer, University of New Haven.

Prof Stoffer said: “He doesn’t want to be vulnerable to anybody else doing something to him if a lot is know about his family.”

The extent of Putin’s finances is difficult to assess given the Kremlin’s penchant for shuffling wealth between themselves and hiding it behind friends, family, and shell companies.

Casey Michel, an expert in kleptocracy and foreign finance, told CNN that Putin had been using his daughters to hide his own fortunes.

He said: “He’s keeping bank accounts, shell companies, and large-scale purchases in the names of, not himself, but those around him.”

Two EU officials, who wished to remain anonymous, have said that the daughters will also be sanctioned by the Union, though neither woman was added to the list as of this morning.

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Vorontsova and Tikhonova have never made an official public appearance with their father and are the offspring of the President’s 31-year marriage with Lyudmila Putina.

The UK’s sanctions designation claimed that Vorontsova, the elder of the children, was born in April 1985, two years after Putin’s marriage, in Leningrad, which is now St Petersburg.

Tikhonova was born a year later in Dresden, where Putin worked as a spy for the KGB until the fall of the Soviet Union.

Both daughters are believed to be extremely wealthy, though the origins of their wealth are not clear.

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The younger daughter Tikhonova was described by the US as a “tech executive”, and was married to Kirill Shamalov, who became Russia’s youngest billionaire at 32, from 2013 until 2018.

Tikhonova studied at St Petersburg State University and reportedly has a master’s degree in physics and mathematics.

Her elder sister Vorontsova is believed to be a scientist specialising in paediatric endocrinology, which is the study of the effects of hormones on the body.

She leads state-funded programmes that have allegedly received billions of dollars from the Kremlin.

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