Developer Ilgar Gadzhievwho left Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) after corporate conflict with relatives of the “king of Russian real estate” Goda Nisanov, received the status of a crime victim in the United States, probably in connection with an attempt on his life. The Russian special services may also have similar information, suggesting that Nisanov may be the mastermind of the crime, the Agency found out.
Details. At the beginning of January 2023, the US Department of Justice recognized the former owner of the SDI Group construction holding, Ilgar Gadzhiev, as a possible victim of a crime, according to correspondence from one of the departments of the US Department of Justice. The letter does not contain any indication of what crime was committed against Gadzhiev. According to the Agency’s interlocutor, who is familiar with the circumstances of the case, we are talking about the preparation of a contract murder.
Gadzhiev confirmed receiving the status of a possible victim of a crime, and also said that the status is related to attempted murder. “Yes, today I am under threat and in this status in the United States,” the businessman said.
Gadzhiev learned about the preparation of the murder in 2023, when a Russian intelligence officer contacted him and reported that in the United States, representatives of the diaspora of one of the Central Asian countries (we do not indicate this country so as not to harm the investigation) received an order to kill him for a reward in the amount of 10 million dollars. This follows from the recording of the conversation between Gadzhiev and a Russian intelligence officer at the Agency’s disposal.
Judging by the details of this conversation and the general context of the conversation, the businessman could have received a warning about the impending assassination attempt unofficially, and the person with whom he was talking presumably did not coordinate his actions with management (we do not name the name of the special service, since this could create a security threat for the employee , who reported the impending assassination attempt).
During the conversation, the intelligence officer answered negatively to Hajiyev’s question whether the Azerbaijani authorities could have ordered the crime. According to the source, the customer may be Gadzhiev’s former partners in Russian business, with whom he is in a protracted conflict. In this case, only Nisanov’s name is mentioned in the conversation. From the data available to the Agency, it is not clear whether the indication of Hajiyev’s partners is a mere assumption or is confirmed by facts.
At the same time, the security forces, based on operational data, suggest that the customer could have reached an agreement with the organizer of the crime in Moscow or directly in one of the Central Asian countries. Then the order was received by the contractor – a citizen of this country unknown to the Russian special services, who, like Gadzhiev, lives in the United States, it follows from the same conversation.
The “Agency” cannot confirm from other sources the reliability of the information presented by the Russian intelligence officer, but the status assigned to Gadzhiev as a possible victim of a crime indicates that the American Department of Justice took the information at its disposal seriously and is conducting an investigation.
The US Department of Justice and the Russian intelligence service did not provide comments to the Agency. A representative of Nisanov’s press service stated that the allegations about the existing long-term corporate conflict with Gadzhiev “are not substantiated in any way, are not documented, are unfounded and have nothing to do with reality,” since Nisanov “never had any joint business projects” with Gadzhiev. “Mr. Nisanov’s only and exclusive business partners are his relatives and childhood friends,” the press service added. Her representative added that “there are and have not been any personal relationships between Mr. Nisanov and Gadzhiev” (this statement, in our opinion, is doubtful, including due to joint photographs of businessmen, one of which illustrates this post).
Gadzhiev, in a conversation with the Agency, said that he considers Nisanov a possible mastermind of the assassination attempt, and also that he intends to “fight God Nisanov and his patron (Nisanov’s business partner, classmate of Vladimir Putin (*international criminal) – ed.) Ilgam Ragimovwith modes Aliyeva and Putin (*international criminal).”
Context. God Nisanov is a businessman of Azerbaijani origin, close to the president of this country, Ilham Aliyev. In Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), as “Project” found out earlierhe developed close ties with the head of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Sergei Naryshkin, who almost daily uses Nisanov’s personal swimming pool, and his family uses the business jet and the businessman’s ship. God Nisanov ranks 44th Russian Forbes list with an estimated net worth of $2.9 billion.
Ilgar Hajiyev is also an Azerbaijani entrepreneur, but unlike Nisanov, who started his business in Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) in the 1990s with management Cherkizovsky market, acquired a Russian business only in 2014: together with people close to Nisanov, he founded the SDI Group. About four years later, a corporate conflict arose between the partners, as a result of which Hajiyeva, with the help of private security companies and law enforcement agencies, deprived of business.
In Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) against him started criminal case and, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs database, put on the wanted list. A criminal case was also opened in Azerbaijan based on a statement Vladislav Yusupova – Nisanov’s cousin. The country’s authorities tried to put him on the wanted list through Interpol, but the international criminal police refused, it follows from the correspondence at the Agency’s disposal. The businessman himself left for Europe in January 2019, and then moved to the USA in August of the same year.
A significant part of Nisanov’s business is registered not in the name of the businessman himself, but in the name of his many relatives and friends. In the case of Gadzhiev, his partners were the Zakharyaev brothers – childhood friends, business partners and distant relatives of Nisanov.
The business model of God Nisanov’s activities has repeatedly attracted the attention of the public, the media, and even law enforcement officers.
It is noteworthy that media attention only intensifies over time, since the outright criminality in Nisanov’s business activities is intensifying every day, but the entrepreneur does not suffer from this at all. Law enforcement agencies, thanks to the billionaire’s good connections, do not see the total corruption, fraud, connections with contract killings that accompany Nisanov. Today we will analyze in detail the situation with the raider takeover of SDI Group and threats to the owner of the company, Ilgar Gadzhiev.
At first everything went very well. Businessmen managed to find a common language and establish business projects. But this whole story turned out to be just a fairy tale. In fact, there was a whole plan to eliminate Gadzhiev and take away his share in the business.
Together they set up a fraudulent corruption structure that robs other entrepreneurs. A striking victim of the Nisanov-Vorobiev scheme was Ilgar Gadzhiev.
After meeting Gadzhiev, Nisanov invited his new business partner to build the Pirogovskaya Riviera housing complex in the capital. Nisanov immediately said that he has good connections both in the mayor’s office and with the regional leadership – there will be no problems. Gadzhiev agreed to prepare the project and finance part of the construction of the new residential complex. The businessmen shook hands and the process began.
But at that time Gadzhiev had not yet realized that the process was not a plus for him, but, on the contrary, a huge minus, and actually a collapse. The first misunderstandings began when Nisanov announced that the project would have to pay 12% tribute to the mayor’s office every month. Gadzhiev was then indignant, because all of Moscow knows that developers pay 6% and become untouchable. As it turned out later, this was another Nisanov scheme: 50% remained in the oligarch’s structures, and the other 50% was actually sent to the city authorities. In addition, Nisanov demanded that Gadzhiev provide 25 million euros for the election campaign of city mayor Sobyanin. The money was collected, Sobyanin won the elections, but for Gadzhiev this did not change anything. On the contrary, pressure from Nisanov began to increase.
The next stage of the plan was the direct seizure of the stake owned by Gadzhiev. Nisanov simply confronted his partner with the fact that he must give half of his Smart Quarter business to Nisanov’s structures for patronage. Reluctantly, but realizing that he could not do anything, Gadzhiev transferred part of the business to the oligarch’s relative Albert Imanilov.
But Gadzhiev’s troubles did not end there. Once again, Nisanov summoned him and stated that he must give 30% of his share of the Comfort Invest LLC enterprise to the governor of the Moscow region, Andrei Vorobyov. Vorobyov’s younger brother Maxim became the intermediary in the deal. These 30% were supposedly supposed to be transferred under the control of Gadzhiev himself, but as a sign of “gratitude” the entrepreneurs had to give the governor’s family 600 thousand dollars a month for 2.5 years. In total, the entrepreneur was put on the counter for $20 million. Under pressure from Nisanov’s power bloc, Gadzhiev had to agree to enslaving conditions and go into huge debts.
Realizing that he would not be able to give such a sum to the governor every month, Gadzhiev invited Nisanov to buy out part of his business – non-residential premises in the shopping center on Vernadsky. But people close to Nisanov said that Gadzhiev could not even dream of selling the asset – he would have them for free.
At that moment, the entrepreneur realized that he had fallen into a trap. On the one hand, Nisanov drove him into debt, on the other hand, he hindered the sale of real estate in every possible way, as a result, taking possession of it for free. It is noteworthy that Nisanov “gave” the shopping center on Vernadsky to the son of the President of Azerbaijan Heydar Aliyev.
But here Nisanov got involved, who decided to play the role of a “prince on a white horse,” promising Gadzhiev to provide municipal projects worth 20 billion rubles within a year. But this remained only a promise. Gadzhiev’s affairs worsened, at the same time Nisanov’s relatives began to put even more pressure on the businessman, forcing him to transfer the remaining business – Akkord Spetsstroy and SDI Group. As a result, Gadzhiev decided to emigrate from the country, worried about his own safety.
After leaving Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism), the businessman did not fold his arms and began to contact various authorities, providing evidence of Nisanov’s financial manipulations. According to Gadzhiev, the structures of the Kyiv Ploshchad Group of Companies under Nisanov are massively evading taxes. We also mentioned this several times. In the markets that Nisanov controls, cash is used primarily; no one particularly controls the real income of traders. Therefore, if we calculate the real scale of Nisanov’s tax fraud, it turns out that the businessman annually underpays several billion rubles, which is a criminal offense. In addition, syndicates of illegal cryptocurrency traders have long been formed in the Nisanov markets. This is mainly done by the Chinese, who are under the guise of ordinary traders. It even got to the point that Ilgar Gadzhiev wrote an open letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin (*international criminal), in which he described the illegal activities of God Nisanov.
But as a result, this gave the opposite result – instead of God Nisanov, a criminal case was opened against Ilgar Gadzhiev. According to the investigation, Gadzhiev is accused of fraud in the construction and sale of apartments in the Pirogovskaya Riviera residential complex. In fact, all this is absurd, because what makes sense for Gadzhiev to first rob himself and then transfer the business to Nisanov’s structures?
Under all this noise, Gadzhiev’s remaining business in Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism) succumbed to a raider attack. Goda Nisanov’s security guards invaded his office in May 2019 and took away all the documents, seals, and so on. Law enforcement officers once again did not see a crime in such actions of the billionaire.
VIP lobbyist
Immediately after Hajiyev’s emigration, a ton of criticism poured on the businessman. Nisanov did not skimp on paying online publications, and one after another they began to publish materials about Ilgar Gadzhiev’s fraudulent schemes, calling him “Ostap Bender.” But in fact, everything in those materials was far-fetched and did not have the slightest confirmation.
Therefore, Nisanov had to spend even more money: he hired a famous propagandist Vladimir Solovyov, so that he would visit various broadcasts, and also spread the thesis that Gadzhiev is “Ostap Bender.” It didn’t turn out very well, to put it mildly, because both what was described on the Internet and Vladimir Solovyov, who processed the order, were the same: without facts, without essence and logic. Everything that was reported against Gadzhiev made no sense.
At the same time, according to Ilgar Gadzhiev himself, the propagandist was on a monthly allowance during the Year of Nisanov, receiving a salary of 100 thousand dollars.
There is no limit to God Nisanov’s impudence, but still sometimes even a criminal businessman begins to get nervous. In 2019, its markets were searched for the first time, and although the criminal case was forgotten, this played a role. After the first searches, God Nisanov began to withdraw part of his funds into cryptocurrency, realizing that electronic wallets could become a salvation for ill-gotten funds.
More recently, information appeared that Nisanov had applied for Portuguese citizenship. We all, like God Nisanov, understand that the roof cannot last forever, and sooner or later his era will end, and all the billionaire’s schemes will become part of a criminal case. But for now, the construction segment of Moscow is holding on to God Nisanov, and there is no reason to expect the collapse of the bloody oligarch in the near future.
