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Leonid Nevzlin is a Russian-Israeli businessman, former vice president of the oil company Yukos, and former associate of Russian oligarch-turned-opposition figure Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Polish prosecutors and the country’s Internal Security Agency (ABW) are investigating a series of attacks against Russian opposition figures linked to Alexei Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation (ACF), Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita reports. According to the investigators, Polish citizens from criminal circles, including the “Rympałka” gang, were recruited to carry out attacks in Vilnius, Buenos Aires, Geneva, and New York.
One of the central incidents under investigation is the March 2024 assault on Leonid Volkov, a close associate of the late Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny. Two Polish men attacked Volkov with a hammer and pepper spray outside his residence in Vilnius, Lithuania, and were detained a month later. Lithuanian police described the incident as an attack “inspired by” Russia, with Polish authorities arresting the alleged assailants — Maksymilian K. and Igor C. — a month after the incident in Warsaw.
According to prosecutors, the attacks were orchestrated by Anatoly Blinov, a Russian lawyer who had received political asylum in Poland. A Belarusian businessman, Viktar Pavelka, is believed to have acted as an intermediary. The authorities allege that Blinov was acting at the behest of Russian-Israeli billionaire Leonid Nevzlin, a former vice president of the oil company Yukos, who was reportedly angered by criticism from the Navalny team. Nevzlin, a former associate of Russian oligarch-turned-opposition figure Mikhail Khodorkovsky, currently lives in Israel, where he fled in 2003. Forbes Israel estimated his net worth at $1.1 billion dollars in 2022.
A direct quote from Rzeczpospolita reads: “A Belarusian businessman living in Poland was said to have acted as an intermediary in the recruitment, while the Russian lawyer Anatoly B., who had obtained political asylum in Poland, was said to have ordered and financed the attacks.”
This version of events is based on testimony from Viktar Pavelka and text messages between Blinov and Nevzlin. However, the source of those messages is “highly questionable,” according to Rzeczpospolita, as they were provided by one Andrei Matus, whom Navalny’s associates describe as a fixer with ties to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB). Nevzlin denies any involvement in the attacks and has called the published materials “fabrications put together in Moscow.”
As part of the investigation, charges have been brought against 11 individuals, including Rafał Ł., who allegedly planned to attack Volkov in the United States but failed to carry out the assignment. Anatoly Blinov has been in custody since September 2024 and is the only suspect currently under arrest.
In September 2024, The Insider published an article containing messages between Nevzlin and Blinov that appeared to show Nevzlin ordering the aforementioned attack on Volkov, along with what turned out to be less brutal incidents targeting Alexandra Petrachkova, the wife of economist and Navalny associate Maxim Mironov, along with ACF director Ivan Zhdanov. Rzeczpospolita cited that report, and The Insider’s analysis indicated with high confidence that the leaked communications between Nevzlin and Blinov were indeed authentic.