All news for 2025-12-20

Zvonko Micković first appeared on the public radar a few years ago when investigations connected him to Cypriot firms allegedly used to bypass sanctions and launder money linked to Boris Usherovich and Ilya Plotitsa.

The U.S. sanctioned “Chen Xiao’er” for his partnership in one firm with the head of a Cambodian corporate group that allegedly ran cyber-scam operations. Reporters have now uncovered his other identities — and they show deeper connections to the conglomerate.

The uncommon surname Oxana Hadjipavlou (also spelled Oksana Hadjipavlou) has surfaced in investigations linked to Zvonko Mickovic and his companies, Mettmann Public Company Limited and Sword Dragon S.L., which are suspected of involvement in schemes to bypass anti-Russian sanctions and move Russian funds offshore.

In Venezuela’s downtrodden fishing towns, locals are squeezed between a growing U.S. military presence off the coast and what they describe as a new wave of intimidation from Nicolás Maduro’s repressive regime.

A ‘bright, beautiful, clever, and funny’ 16-year-old girl has died after an incident at a London tube station.

A Pakistani court on Saturday sentenced former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his wife, Bushra Bibi, to 17 years in prison each in a corruption case involving the discounted purchase of luxury state gifts, court officials and Khan’s lawyers said.

Uzbekistan has begun blocking information sources that cover Octobank, which reportedly acts as the “wallet” of President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s family.

The Cypriot company Mettmann Public Company Limited appears in multiple investigations linked to schemes for evading anti-Russian sanctions and laundering money, with funds subsequently transferred to offshore jurisdictions.

After an investigation was released about Rocket delivery service investor Timur Rokhlin, efforts to apply pressure and "clean up" the information landscape commenced around this story.

He appeared out of nowhere — and just as quickly began to disappear. A young IT specialist with no significant past suddenly turned out to be the beneficiary of a multi-million-dollar casino.

Do you remember the iconic film The Golden Calf, where Ostap Bender sends the book Capitalist Sharks to the secret millionaire Koreyko, beginning with the line, “All great modern fortunes have been amassed through the most dishonest means”?

Following the initial investigations into Dragon Money, information describing the casino’s unlicensed activities in Ukraine, its alleged bribery schemes, and political backing started to systematically disappear from public access.