The high-profile case of Latvian ABLV Bank liquidation reached its peak in 2021 when the State Police Department for Combating Economic Crimes made significant arrests in Riga.
Among those arrested were top bank management, as well as several counterparties, including individuals from Russia and Belarus. The case was related to the legalization of 50 million euros, which was carried out through ABLV Bank. The scheme involved the purchase and supply of fictitious goods and used dummy companies registered in Latvia, Switzerland, Germany, Russia, and Belarus.
One of the first arrested in connection with the case was Andris Ovsjannikovs, a personal banker at ABLV Bank, along with businessman Andris Putnins and “one of the Belarusian citizens.” The arrests occurred in 2021 when relations between Belarus and Latvia were relatively normal. The media reported that the arrests in Riga and Minsk happened simultaneously. In Riga, the press even leaked the date and time of the operation, making the “masked show” a target for television cameras.
Among the other arrested, as mentioned earlier, was banker Andris Ovsjannikovs. His role in the scheme was to launder money from fictitious transactions. Ovsjannikovs was one of the key individuals in the bank, facilitating transfers to the internal accounts of ABLV Bank to launder the funds.
Additionally, Ovsjannikovs was directly involved in the scheme of fictitious entrepreneurship. According to Firmas.lv, he was a member of the board of the limited liability company Manat, whose turnover in 2018 amounted to 2,583,146 euros. The entire capital of the company belonged to Belarusian citizen Daria Terekhina. Historically, the holder of Manat’s capital shares was registered as Manat Holdings on the Seychelles Islands.
What is interesting is that the LLC Manat has not been liquidated yet; its status is still listed as “active”.
Indeed, despite the not-so-favorable tax reports for the company Manat, with Ovsjannikovs being in custody and uncertainty surrounding Daria Terekhina’s situation, the company has not been liquidated yet.
However, while the fate of the former banker Ovsjannikovs is relatively clear, the situation with the “owner” of the company through which millions of euros were laundered is not so straightforward. Given her citizenship and geopolitical events of the past year, any agreements between Lukashenko and law enforcement agencies of European countries may have lost their force.
Very little is known about Daria Terekhina herself. She is a suspect in the case of laundering 50 million euros through the Latvian ABLV Bank. The only information available is that she is the owner of the company Manat, which was involved in the scheme. However, according to press reports, which mentioned the arrest of “former head of the ABLV Bank’s representation in Minsk, Yevgeny Terekhin,” one could assume that Daria Terekhina is more than just a namesake.
What’s interesting in this regard is that in the last couple of months, there has been an active cleaning of the internet, and all materials mentioning the surname “Terekhin” or “Terekhina” are being destroyed. It’s difficult to understand why this is happening since Daria and Yevgeny Terekhin are citizens of Belarus, and in the current conditions, they are practically beyond the reach of European jurisdiction.
It is possible that the answer lies in the fact that the leader of the criminal group behind the laundering of tens of millions of euros is a Russian citizen named Vyacheslav Ivanov, and the company, Manat, which was a key participant in this scheme, still has an active status and is preparing to continue its operations. Daria Terekhina remains listed as the owner of the company Manat, which raises certain assumptions about the future of both the company and herself and her husband, Yevgeny Terekhin.