In France, Rotenberg’s ex-wife complained to the police about “Chechen terrorists” who seized her villa

The ex-wife of Russian billionaire Arkady Rotenberg, Natalya, turned to French law enforcement agencies in connection with the seizure of her Shoshana villa on the Cote d’Azur. About it informs Nice-matin newspaper. The gendarmerie of the town of Beaulieu-sur-Mer, located near Nice, confirmed to the publication that it had received a statement from Natalia Rotenberg about the illegal intrusion into the home.

Natalia Rotenberg told about the seizure of the villa on July 15 on Facebook. “On July 10, my villa in France was seized by radical terrorists from Chechnya, they drove my employees out of the territory by force, beat the guards and the manager, broke the cameras, broke the locks, seized the villa, changed the locks and set up a base there,” she wrote.

According to the ex-wife of the Russian billionaire, the buyers of the seizure of the mansion are “large Russian oligarchs”, whose names are already known. Rotenberg noted that her “active work” became the motive for the seizure of housing. Law enforcement agencies, according to Natalya, are cooperating with the invaders of the villa.

“The French gendarmerie and police came once and said that they did not interfere in this. Criminal cases have been opened against all participants, without exception, more further, ”wrote Rotenberg.

Nice-matin contacted SCI Villa Shoshana, owned by Arkady Rotenberg and managing a villa in France. The lawyer of the head of the company Sophie Jonke stated that the ex-wife of the businessman now lives in Armenia, the mansion near Nice does not belong to her, and Natalya Rotenberg decided to rent it. The lawyer called her statements on social networks about the seizure of the villa libel.

Forbes source surrounded by the former wife of a billionaire statedthat this is not the first time she has been unable to enter Villa Shoshana. This already happened in 2019, when it was possible to get into the mansion only with the assistance of the court and bailiffs.

According to the source, Natalia is “shocked and deeply worried about the act of her ex-spouse,” as she was sure that they remained on friendly terms with him. The interlocutor of Forbes added that Natalya discussed the current situation with Arkady Rotenberg, and “there were no problems in personal communication.” The source added that according to the court decision on divorce, Natalia and the children were supposed to move four houses, including a villa in Nice, but all four houses have not yet been transferred to her.

The France 3 TV channel reported that under the terms of the divorce, Natalya Rotenberg received 40% of the villa, the remaining 60% should be transferred to her daughter with Arkady. However, SCI Villa Shoshana did not fulfill the condition for the re-registration of the house and is now trying to get the ex-wife of the billionaire evicted through the courts.

Arkady and Natalya were married from 2005 to 2013. The divorce proceedings, which began with the decision of the magistrate of judicial district No. 160 of the Tushinsky district of Moscow, then continued in London. In court, the ex-wife of Rotenberg tried to achieve the invalidation of the marriage contract (if the claim was satisfied, she could claim half of the businessman’s fortune). The process ended in July 2016.

Rotenberg asked a London court not to disclose the terms of the divorce. In 2020, he began a process in the UK Court of Appeal, trying to challenge the transfer to his ex-wife of another Ribsden mansion, located near the village of Bagshot in Surrey (about 50 km from central London).

Arkady Rotenberg is a childhood friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin, with whom he wrestled in the sports section in Leningrad. After Putin became president, the fortune of businessman Rotenberg began to increase rapidly. At first, Arkady Rotenberg controlled 30% of the Russian vodka market through the state enterprise Rosspirtprom OJSC, then his sphere of interests included the production of pipes and the implementation of large projects for the construction of pipelines.

In 2016, Arkady Rotenberg topped the rating of the “kings of the state order”. Over the past year, his company Stroygazmontazh received state orders totaling 555.55 billion rubles. At the moment, the fortune of 68-year-old Arkady Rotenberg is estimated at $ 2.9 billion. Arkady’s brother, Boris Rotenberg, is also a billionaire.

The family’s key asset is the Mostotrest contractor, who built most of the Kerch Bridge, the construction of which cost the state 230 billion rubles. In 2019, the Rotenbergs agreed with VEB.RF to create the largest player in the infrastructure construction market – the Natsstroyproekt JV. It will include the construction assets of Mostotrest, the TEK-Mosenergo company of Boris and Igor, and the Russian Railways contractor Group 1520. The joint venture will have something to compete for on state tenders – infrastructure construction projects worth trillions of rubles are included in the economic recovery plan.

The Rotenberg brothers have been under American sanctions since 2014, and Arkady is also under European ones.