‘Putin's Man’ wins libel case in High Court of London

Billionaire Roman Abramovich, 55, won a London court case against journalist Catherine Belton and Harper Collins publishing house.  The reason for the controversy was the ‘Putin's People’ bestselling book, released in April 2020.

Belton is a former Moscow correspondent for the Financial Times.  The owner of the Chelsea football club filed an application with the court last spring.

According to The Mirror, Judge Justice Tipples considered a number of statements about Roman Abramovich to be defamatory.

In particular, among them there is a message that the Chelsea sports club was acquired by Abramovich for £ 150 million on the instructions from the Kremlin in order to influence the UK.

The reputation of the Russian oligarch was protected by lawyers from Harbottle & Lewis LLP.  In July, lawyer Hugh Tomlinson, representing Abramovich's interests, sent a message to the court, noting that the readers of the book might make the wrong conclusion that the billionaire was a corrupt person from the ‘dangerous political regime’, who entered into a relationship with Putin as his ‘cashier’.

Belton's court representative, Andrew Caldecott, announced that the book had presented an unequivocal denial of this fact by one of the billionaire's close associates.  However, Judge Tipples was not satisfied.  The statements made in Belton's work were stated as statements of fact, but not as expressions of opinion, she said.

After the announcement of the verdict, the lawyer who represented Abramovich at the trial noted that he welcomed the decision of the judge.

Nine defamatory statements described in the lawsuit originally filed in the spring have been identified in the book.

Representatives of the HarperCollins publishing house, which had previously made a statement about the authority, importance and integrity of the work carried out during writing and preparing the book for publication, said that they would carefully study the content of the verdict in the case, which received such a great public response.  What is more, the publisher's lawyers expressed their joy that three out of four extracts from the book, against which a complaint was filed by the Russian company Rosneft, did not evoke any criticism from the court and were found not to have libelous content.

Several claims of Abramovich himself have also been declined by the court.

It is known that at almost the same time, other Russian ‘rich’ men mentioned in the book also applied to court.  The publishing house managed to conclude an agreement with Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven, without bringing the matter to court.  In accordance with it, information about the relationship of entrepreneurs with the KGB will be removed from all future editions of the book.