Leaders stash billions in offshore accounts

PANAMA PAPERS: Massive information leak

MOSCOW — A Russian concert cellist has been revealed as the linchpin in an elaborate financial empire that manages billions of dollars apparently connected to Vladimir Putin, papers published Sunday show.

Sergei Roldugin, a director of the St. Petersburg Conservatory and guest conductor at the Mariinsky Theatre, met Putin in the 1970s and is considered one of the Russian president’s closest friends.

But papers leaked from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonesca suggest the musician also holds vast assets apparently used to benefit close associates of Putin.

Putin is one of dozens of world leaders, including Syrian President Bashar Assad and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, who have been indirectly or directly linked via friends and family members to offshore companies in the vast leak published by dozens of international media outlets Sunday night.

While Putin is not named in any of the documents, Roldugin is one of several individuals close to the Russian president who appear to manage massive flows of money via shell companies.

Also named is the president of Argentina, Mauricio Macri, and the children of Nawaz Sharif, the Pakistani prime minister.

Other world leaders named in the leaks include Sigmundur Davio Gunnlaugsson, prime minister of Iceland; Salman bin Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al Saud, king of Saudi Arabia; Ayad Allawi, former prime minister of Iraq; Bidzina Ivanishvili, former prime minister of Georgia; Ali Abu al-Ragab, former prime minister of Jordan; Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani, former prime minister of Qatar; Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, former emir of Qatar; Ahmad Ali al-Mirghani, former president of Sudan; Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, president of UAE; and Pavlo Lazarenko, former prime minister of Ukraine.