121: Bill Browder, Putin's thorn. “We all need to be leaders, to stand up against wrong and for right”

This is a special episode featuring a competition winner from North West London Jewish Day School, who won the chance to make an episode of Jonny Gould’s Jewish State with me.

I ran it for Year 6 pupils and was delighted when 11-year-old Bella Bolot stepped up to the plate and secured us an interview with Bill Browder.

Bill is a London-based American-born financier, the CEO and co-founder of Hermitage Capital Management, once the largest foreign portfolio investor in Russia.

On discovering that taxes he was paying to the Russian exchequer were being stolen by middlemen officials, he started to expose large scale systemic corruption in the country. With his Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, he took on large companies like Gazprom and Sidanco. But as they confronted faceless power, the consequences were fatal.

In retaliation, in November 2005, Bill was refused entry to Russia, deported to the UK, and declared a threat to Russian national security.

But Sergei was tortured and murdered in prison for testifying on Bill’s behalf. He takes responsibility for this terrible crime and it totally changed the trajectory of his life, both private and commercial. Bill now heads the Global Magnitsky Justice Campaign.

He gives us a snapshot of what Russia’s become under Vladimir Putin and how life isn’t just made up of comfortable decisions. Sometimes we have to take a stand. My thanks to Miss Caplan and Mr Radomsky at North West London Jewish Day School.

Listen here to Bella’s interview with Bill Browder.

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