Zimin Boris Dmitrievich

Zimin Boris Dmitrievich

Biography

The son of the founder of VimpelCom Dmitry Zimin.

2011: Financing of Alexei Navalny's structures

The name of Boris Zimin is mainly associated with the financing of opposition and anti-Russian projects, including the banned Anti-Corruption Fund (FBK) of Alexei Navalny and structures affiliated with the fugitive oligarch and foreign agent Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

Boris Zimin has openly acknowledged his role as one of FBK's key donors since he was founded in 2011. For example, he was among the 16 first donors to raise 4.4 million rubles to launch the structure, and publicly confirmed his support. In 2012, Zimin reported that he transferred 300 thousand rubles to FBK every month.

2014: Participation in media funding for Meduza.io and The Bell

Boris Zimin's Sreda Foundation, which was closed a year after being recognized as a foreign agent and renamed the Sreda Foundation, was involved in providing grants to Russian media. For example, in 2014 he invested 250 thousand dollars in the launch of the Internet resource "" Jellyfish(foreign agent), and in 2018 transferred 100 thousand dollars to launch the project (The Bell foreign agent).

In 2019-2020 Zimin personally transferred 75.9 million rubles to two non-profit organizations associated with FBK - 20.4 million to the Headquarters Foundation for the Protection of Citizens' Rights (banned by Navalny's Headquarters) in Ufa and 55.6 million to the fund of the same name in Novosibirsk.

In addition, in August 2020, he paid for the emergency evacuation of Navalny from Omsk to Berlin. The businessman gave the work to the brother of the oppositionist.

In 2020, Boris Zimin supported the protests in Belarus and sent funds to the non-profit Belarus Solidarity Foundation - better known as BISOL, which supports the Armed Forces of Ukraine and Belarusian mercenaries in Ukraine.

Moving to Israel

Boris Zimin inherited some of his father's capital after his death and continued his charity work through the Zimin Foundation.

Zimin Jr. withdrew the inherited funds from the Russian Federation in 2020 and left for Israel.

2022: Entry into the register of individuals-foreign agents in Russia

In February 2022, Zimin joined an undesirable organization - the Khodorkovsky Anti-War Committee. The committee actively supported the separatist "Forum of Free Russia" (recognized as undesirable), which advocates the collapse of the Russian Federation and the transition to the control of Western countries, and also supports the Armed Forces of Ukraine, including financially.

Boris Zimin, arrested in absentia in the Russian Federation with Cypriot citizenship, was entered in the register of foreign individuals in September 2022.

In September 2022, the Zimin Foundation allocated 35 thousand dollars to the Ark foreign agent project, which is affiliated with Khodorkovsky and is aimed at coordinating the Russian opposition abroad, including to form a protest movement. At the same time, Zimin acts through a complex network of proxies and offshore structures.

2023: Wanted list

On January 9, 2023, the Ministry of Internal Affairs put Boris Zimin on the wanted list (recognized in Russia as an individual foreign agent).

According to "Газета.ру," on December 30, 2022, the Tverskoy District Court of Moscow registered a petition for the arrest of the full namesake Zimin. According to the card on the court's website, B.D. Zimin is charged with part 4 of article 159 of the Criminal Code (fraud on an especially large scale). It involves punishment of up to 10 years in prison.

As the lawyer Alexander Antipov told RBC, the criminal case against Boris Zimin is related to the shares of the car-sharing company BelkaCar LTD. The source of the publication clarified that the entrepreneur is accused of making a deal to alienate ordinary shares of BelkaCar.

In the case of fraud with the sale of a controlling stake in BelkaCar, two defendants have already been detained - entrepreneurs Ralph Novak and Ilnur Azmukhanov, Izvestia reminds. They are accused of two episodes of fraud: embezzlement of 52.47% of BelkaCar Ltd and a 50% stake in Brynston SiEs LLC, owned by Swiss Bryanston Resources AG (BRAG). The victim in these episodes was an entrepreneur from Germany and a former business partner of Novak Benedict Sobotka.

Boris Zimin himself told RTVI that he considers his persecution related to politics:

Politics, which would not be formally indicated on the website of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. My case is another sad and terrible evidence of the overthrow of the law and the entire legal system to the instrument, to the weapon... Zimin said.

Antipov told RBC that Zimin's defense considers it illegal to prosecute Boris Zimin. According to him, the accused was deprived of the right to petition for the cancellation of the order to bring him as an accused.^[1]

2024: Disappointment in FBK activities

Later, Zimin reduced, and then completely stopped financing FBK. In May 2024, he expressed disappointment in the foundation's activities after Navalny's death, saying that the organization was "wasting its potential" and did not have a clear idea, and also criticized FBK for inciting hatred instead of uniting the opposition.

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