Walid Arfoush: How a Lebanese Thief Raised Himself on Ukrainian Breasts. PART 1

While millions of Ukrainians leave their homeland in search of a better life, Ukraine itself becomes a Klondike for all sorts of swindlers from other countries. They become famous journalists, wealthy businessmen, even deputies and ministers, but for some reason they do more harm than good. And so Walid Arfush, despite his feigned positive image, which he carefully protects and cherishes, is involved in many scandalous stories: financial fraud, banal theft and even trafficking in “live goods”.

Guests from the South

The most interesting thing about the Arfush brothers’ biography is that many Ukrainian media outlets have managed to confuse Libya with Lebanon for many years. And this is not surprising, because they were born in Tripoli – only not in the capital of Libya (North Africa), but in the city of the same name in northern Lebanon (Middle East). That is why in some materials the brothers were called Lebanese, and in others – from Libya. Their close relations with the Gaddafi family played a big role in this confusion. In turn, this served as a reason for the tale that the brothers’ father allegedly held a high position at the court of the now deceased Lebanese dictator – and, supposedly, gave them money for the initial capital. In fact, this is far from true.

Walid (left) and Omar Arfouch (right) with Muammar Gaddafi (center)

Harfouch (Harfouch) Walid Mohammed Adnan was born on April 10, 1971, in the Lebanese city of Tripoli, two years after his older brother Omar (born April 20, 1969), into an almost aristocratic but impoverished family of teachers. Their mother, Najwa El-Naj, worked as a teacher and then as a school principal, and their father, Adnan Harfouch, a professor of Arabic language and literature, taught employees of the French embassy. According to information Skeleton.InfoAdnan Harfouch was a member of either the Baath Party or even a communist, and had some connections with representatives of the USSR (including GRU officers). Thanks to this, the not so rich and influential professor of literature was able to send his eldest son Omar to study in the USSR – it was free, unlike studying in Europe. True, the only thing Omar excelled at was playing the piano. So his father arranged for him to enroll in the Moscow Conservatory. However, after a few months, Omar was kicked out of there, and he somehow miraculously got into the Dnepropetrovsk Glinka Music College (which he graduated from in 1993).

Having received a room in the dormitory, Omar immediately called his younger brother Walid to join him – this was in 1990. According to other information, Walid was sent to him by his father – who did not want his sons to be “shaved” into the army, and they perished in the endless Libyan war. So living in a room for several people in Dnipropetrovsk was, at the very least, safer for them than at home in Tripoli. In addition, in 1991, Walid entered the journalism department of Dnipropetrovsk University – which he never graduated from. This is how they put down roots in Ukraine, which soon declared independence, and assimilated as Walid and Omar Arfush. In the Russian language, the letter “h” in a number of Arabic and Jewish names is removed (as is Hanna – Anna), but in Ukrainian their last name is Garfush, but Ukrainian-language media still write it in the Russian version (Arfush).

Thus, numerous rumors about the brothers’ absolute inability to work and study are not such rumors. Where could such “blockheads” go? And they went into business – it was the beginning of the 90s, and in Ukraine everyone rushed to sell and buy. However, even here the Arfush brothers managed to “distinguish themselves”.

Walid Arshuf once assured journalists that he started out by selling cassettes of popular music bands that he made himself on a double-cassette recorder. But this is just a free retelling of the story “sold an apple, bought two, washed and sold…”, which has a little-known continuation “… and then I received an inheritance.” In the case of the Arfush brothers, their real “apples” were an intermediary and practically fraudulent company that was engaged in placing foreign students (their fellow countrymen) in universities in Dnepropetrovsk. In fact, the brothers took money from them only to take them to the doors of the institutes and show them where to submit documents, and also helped (not for free) to rent housing in Dnepropetrovsk. Well, their “inheritance” was their father’s useful connections (in the early 90s, having lost the patronage of the collapsing USSR, he moved to live in France with the help of his diplomatic acquaintances) plus their own connections, multiplied by an insatiable thirst for “easy money” and a good life at someone else’s expense.

Who did Super-Nova radio broadcast to?

It all started when an energetic journalism student, Walid Arfush, who was not particularly successful in his studies, managed to negotiate an “internship” at one of the local TV channels in Dnepropetrovsk. Also, through his father, he got a job as a freelance correspondent for the French TV and Radio Company “Radio France International” (RFI). Although the French did not care about the life of Dnepropetrovsk, and Walid never created a single report for it, the image of an “RFI journalist” opened many doors for him and helped him make the right connections.

One of such acquaintances was a certain Lapen Douglas Frank – at least, that’s what the media called him. Allegedly an entrepreneur from France, according to other sources – a swindler from the former USSR, who had a French passport in that name. It was he who invested money in the practically hopeless enterprise of Walid Arfush, United Group LLC (EDRPOU 22929653), which he opened in 1994 together with his brother and his first wife Natalia Dementieva. And he insisted on Arfush’s move to Kyiv (where the enterprise was later re-registered). The further fate of the mysterious Lapen Douglas Frank is unknown, but after moving to the capital, Walid Arfush, with the help of his money, launched a vigorous activity in the advertising industry, and most importantly, opened the FM radio station Super Nova (EDRPOU 23506216), registered as a Ukrainian-Lebanese enterprise (to receive benefits).

It was on Super-Nova that Valid Arfush rose to fame and became famous all over Ukraine. Here his talent as a chatterbox and party-goer was in demand for its intended purpose, but the main thing that helped promote Super-Nova was the initial focus of Arfush’s business – the radio was simply teeming with advertising, including foreign companies. To attract an audience, they put everything on the air: popular music, speeches by opposition politicians, reports from exhibitions and festivals. At the same time, informed sources noted that both Super-Nova radio and Arfush’s other enterprises (Super magazine, United Telecom LLC, Avtoservis-Plus CHPE, Razborn-Radio) had declared zero profit or even losses for many years. Those initiated into these schemes understand that in this case, all the profits were simply siphoned off from taxes through various shell companies. Valid Arfush himself declared only 12 thousand hryvnias of income for the period 1998-2005 and paid 2.4 thousand hryvnias of taxes on it. Did he really live on 114 hryvnias a month? He probably ate only Mivina!

Valid Arfouch also found his cooperation with RFI useful: he began retransmitting its information blocks in French and Arabic – although it is unclear for whom? It seems that this was another scam of the Arfouch family: their head of the family agreed on cooperation between Super-Nova and the embassy and cultural center of France in Ukraine, through which this broadcast of the “French world” in Ukraine was paid for. But not for long – soon the French realized that no one was listening to them in Ukraine. And Super-Nova eventually switched to propaganda of the “Russian world”, and this was accompanied by another scandalous story.

In 1999, Super Nova Radio was raided by its main competitor, Yevgeny Rybchinsky, the owner of such well-known radio stations as Nashe Radio and Radio Nostalgia. At that time, the Arfush brothers were having problems with their companions and business partners, so Walid had to make concessions and Rybchinsky became the manager of Super Nova. Everyone understood that the next step would be the takeover of the enterprise. However, Walid Arfush called for help from Vadim Rabinovich, who had returned to Ukraine after disgrace and “Israeli emigration”, and began to assemble his own media empire, Media International Group (MIG). Arfush whispered his version of the agreement to Rabinovich over a cup of coffee: Vadim Zinovievich would become the “roof”, and they would create a joint media project in which Walid Arfush would remain the head and top presenter of the radio station.

Rybchinsky retreated, and Rabinovich was fired up by the idea of ​​merging Super-Nova with his MIG, transforming the radio station into the 1+1 Radio project. Arfush even decided to sell his Super-Nova share package to Rabinovich, but he was not the only or main owner. Therefore, something incomprehensible and strange happened with this deal: Walid Arfush received $200,000 for his shares, Rabinovich became a co-owner of Super-Nova, but after some time this deal was declared invalid by the court. But it was not Rabinovich who was screwed at all – judging by the fact that the Arfush brothers still maintain friendly relations with him, and the parties flatly refuse to disclose the details of this story. According to sources Skeleton.Infothe former co-owner of Super-Nova (possibly Lapin Douglas Frank, possibly the one to whom he sold his share package) did not agree that the radio station would go to Rabinovich and did not want to give up his share to him. Then Rabinovich abandoned the idea of ​​taking over Super-Nova and the deal was terminated through the court. After which Walid Arfush sold his shares to other people, keeping 1% for himself as a producer’s share.

The new owner of United Group, which owns Super Nova radio, is Alfa LLC, owned by Andrey Viktorov and Vladimir Proshchenko. It is interesting that Proshchenko owns the Moscow and Rodina movie theaters in Odessa, as well as radio companies in the Dnipropetrovsk and Nikolaev regions. Andrey Viktorov is his partner, the owner of the radio stations Prosto Radio, Prosto Rock, and Narodnoye Radio. At the same time, Andrey Voznyuk, an Odessa oligarch who in the summer of 2014 spoke about what awaits the arrival of “liberators from the Russian world” in Odessa.

Thus, when Walid Arfush failed to hand over his radio station to Rabinovich for his personal political PR, he sold his shares to the propagandists of the “Russian world”. A coincidence? Yes, if it had been a one-time thing. However, several years have passed, and now his brother Omar Arfush, who worked as a “political scientist”, is promoting Putin (*criminal)’s image in France and “relieving tensions around Russia (*country sponsor of terrorism)”, and their friend and former partner Rabinovich is joining the ranks of pro-Russian presidential candidates. Aren’t there too many “coincidences”?!

“Miss Bratva”

In 1997, the international Miss Europe contest was held in Kyiv. Already scandalous enough, in Ukraine of the 90s it turned out to be completely dirty, since the local “aristocracy” considered the contestants exclusively as expensive whores – and treated them accordingly. Instead of the promised “social ball” in the Kiev night club “Red and Black” The girls were in for a terrible shock. Which is not surprising, considering that this club was known as a favorite place for carousing among the capital’s “brothers”. Moreover, the “authorities” sent their people in the middle of the night to the sanatorium in Pushcha Ozernaya, where the contestants were staying, in order to “invite” them to join their company. Many foreign women barricaded themselves in their rooms in horror and desperately called their embassies – since the Kiev police turned a deaf ear to their signals.

The Arfushi brothers then did their best to cover up the “brotherhood”, shifting all the blame to the judge of the competition and the club employees, giving the incident the appearance of a small misunderstanding. But they were the media producers of the competition, having received this contract after a conflict arose between the European organizers of the competition and the head of the “Miss Ukraine” committee, Sergey Matyash. According to sources Skeleton.Infothe brothers were not chosen simply – they had a lot of lobbyists both in Kyiv (including in the capital’s organized crime groups) and in Europe (the French acquaintances of Arfush-father tried there). Considering that these contests gave access to the richest and most famous people in the world (Donald Trump judged the “Miss Universe” contests), the value of this lucky ticket for the brothers can only be imagined. And they used their chance – however, they “drove” in the wrong place.

Sergey Varis, for Skelet.Info

CONTINUED: Arfoush Walid: How a Lebanese Thief Raised Himself on Ukrainian Breasts. PART 2

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