Alaco

15.04.2016 | Panama papers reporting plays into Kremlin’s hands

Exaggerated claims by western media of Putin’s links to tax havens have enabled Moscow to dismiss the reports as attempts to destabilise Russia.

Much of the international media reporting on the Panama papers has focused on the Russian President’s alleged connections with offshore funds.  For example, among the numerous stories on the subject, headlines have appeared describing the leaks as the “trail to Vladimir Putin” while other reports have spoken of billion-dollar  transactions involving people and companies with ties to Putin.  The problem with these reports is that they imply a direct link between offshore trusts and the Russian President.  That, however, does not appear to be supported by any of the Mossack Fonseca documents that have so far come to light.

To its credit, it was the newspaper that broke the story, Suddeutsche Zeitung, which came closest to accurately reporting the facts of the matter.  The German title’s headline, “Putin’s rich friends”, cleverly avoids pointing the finger at Putin by outlining instead a system of patronage that the Russian leader has developed – described by US political scientist Karen Dawisha as his “Kleptocracy” – in order to prevent a direct link between him and proceeds of corruption.

In Russia, anti-corruption campaigners, most notably Alexei Navalny, have for years strived to expose the systematic nature of corruption at the highest echelons of power.  Their open source investigations have revealed the way the political and business elite of Russia have sought to appropriate state funds, but the probes have steered away from implicating Putin because of the difficulty and the inherent danger of doing so.

Media outlets that focused on the Russian President in their reporting of the Mossack Fonseca revelations have simply played into the hands of the Kremlin, which can legitimately deny Putin’s direct involvement and claim that the West is conspiring to destabilise Russia.  This is exactly what Russian state news organs have done, lambasting the West’s “fetishisation” of Putin and dismissing the allegations as part of an information war.  Putin’s Russia derives political strength from convincing the population that the nation is under threat.  Some of the reporting on the Panama papers has enabled it to do just that.

Many pro-Kremlin newspapers ignored the leak altogether and some used the attacks on Putin to change the focus of the discussion.  Lenta.ru’s reporting in the days following the Panama revelations were particularly telling.  One headline on its front page spoke of “A Useless Leak” while another declared sarcastically that “The Quality of the Investigation into Putin's Ties Has Disappointed the Kremlin”.  The reaction of Russian tabloids should not be a distraction from the wider issue, but they make a point.  The Panama papers hold valuable information that can be used to illustrate the modern face of corruption.  It would be a shame to see insufficient diligence in their handling undermine the important message that they carry.