How English libel law enables Russian kleptocrats

Tories and Putin’s cronies are both impedance-matched and comorbid.

5 min readMar 4, 2022

An English five pound note; the Queen’s mouth has been erased and covered over with an outsized zip. The zipper pull is colored in the white/blue/red stripes of the Russian flag.

Given the Current Circumstances, now is a good time to revisit the special relationship between UK elites — lawyers, estate agents, legislators — and Russian oligarchs, which was brilliantly documented in a Dec 2021 report from Chatham House:

How English libel law enables Russian kleptocrats

Tories and Putin’s cronies are both impedance-matched and comorbid.

Written by Cory Doctorow