Superstar Maria Maksakova lived the life of the ruling class in ultra-expensive Moscow apartments, vacationed in Cannes and participated in Kremlin festivities.

· Opera diva of the world famous Mariinsky Theater and Bolshoi Theater.

· Television star with his own program.

· Politician of Putin's own party, United Russia.

Now she has been declared an enemy of the people and a traitor.

“I left because I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in pseudo-patriotic hysteria,” says Maria Maksakova in an interview with Aftenposten.

From superstars to enemies of the people

Aftenposten met one of Russia's most wanted women in the lobby of a luxury hotel in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.

Aftenposten: How does a person feel who is called a traitor and enemy of the people in the Russian media?

Maksakova: This is really bad. At the same time, it feels funny and absolutely absurd.

Within two weeks, she was fired from her job at a Russian music academy, expelled from Putin's party for "illegal dual citizenship" and branded in pro-Kremlin media as a "political prostitute."

Her Russian record company canceled the upcoming project.

“Who knows what these raging people will do. It's not that I was very scared. I just feel powerless. There is no use trying to explain your actions."

That's why the Kremlin was shocked

Her husband, Denis Voronenkov, agreed in January to testify against ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, who had close ties to the Russian regime.

On January 28, a Ukrainian investigator boasted in the Kyiv media that he had a new “key witness.”

“Then I realized that the temperature would rise. On the same day I flew out of Moscow. But I never thought that the reaction would be so strong. And so evil."

Many are fleeing Russia

From 2014 to 2016, according to official data, 800 thousand people emigrated from Russia.

Previously, the most famous defectors were activists, oppositionists, journalists and businessmen who dared to challenge Putin, such as the founder of the social network Vkontakte Pavel Durov.

No one thought the superstar and her wealthy power elite husband would run away too.

“If many members of the elite flee, people begin to wonder what is happening. I think this is the reason why so much anger is directed at me. They want to scare others who think the same way we do.”

Tarnished reputation

Russia specialist Helge Blakkisrud of the Norwegian Foreign Policy Institute (NUPI) said the case was considered special precisely because Maksakova decided to go to Ukraine, a country at odds with Russia.

“The regime does not want to attract much attention to the fact that some people decide to go there. Refugees who fled Ukraine's Donbass region for Russia are often mentioned in media reports. When representatives of the Russian elite decide to go in the opposite direction, this is a blow to the reputation of the Russian authorities,” says the researcher.

He believes Maksakova's decision to leave Russia illustrates a deeper problem.

“The situation is such that entry into Russia exceeds exit from it. However, the departure illustrates the brain drain. Many of those leaving are highly educated people, while those coming are unskilled labor. From this point of view, we can state a distortion in the migration process, which in the long term can create economic problems in Russia.

Blakkisrud does not believe the departure will have immediate political consequences.

“Those leaving Russia at the present time are often people who do not identify themselves with Putin’s project and are not considered some kind of ‘loss’ for the regime,” he states.

Song duet with the chief of spies

Until the fall of 2016, Maria Maksakov and her husband Voronenkov were members of parliament, she from Putin’s party, he from the Communist Party.

Context

Why are deputies fleeing to Ukraine and not from Ukraine?

Why should ex-deputies flee to Ukraine?

The departure of Russian scientists to the West: business trips, emigration or exodus?

When love arose between them in the Duma and they got married in March 2015, many powerful people from Putin’s inner circle came to their wedding.

The head of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), Sergei Naryshkin, who was the Speaker of the Duma at that time, sang a duet with the bride.

“Everyone on television or in debate acts like an actor in a theater play.”

The Kremlin elite loves Europe

Among the friends were Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov, as well as Russia Today chief and the Kremlin's chief propagandist Dmitry Kiselev.

“I know them both. A few years ago they were very European integrated. They went there whenever they wanted."

Kiselev is currently included in the sanctions lists.

Among the friends there was also a person who was considered a great Putin strategist - the former head of the presidential administration in the Kremlin, Vladislav Surkov.

“People choose to live in the vacuum they create and tell themselves that they are doing God's will. It's hypnotic hysteria."

They make small decisions every day

According to Maksakova, the entry of Russian soldiers into Crimea in March 2014 came as a shock to many in the Kremlin.

“Many representatives of the elite were downright frightened by this. But everyone knows that it’s dangerous to say what you think.”

— Do the rulers in the Kremlin themselves believe the propaganda that God has instructed Russia to liberate the land, that fascists rule Ukraine, and that the West and NATO want to destroy Russia?

“They make small decisions all the time, every day. After this, they find an opportunity to justify themselves for what they have done. Slowly but surely they become trapped by these hypnotic ideas. We are fighting the world.

Lack of heroes

Maksakova’s husband was a bureaucrat all the time before his election to the Duma in 2012. Nevertheless, he made a large fortune for himself.

Denis Voronenkov left Moscow at the end of October a few days before his parliamentary immunity expired.

According to the independent Novaya Gazeta, he is a typical Russian politician who is being investigated in several criminal cases. He always, as the newspaper writes, “miraculously” got out of this situation.

According to the Panama Papers leak, he owned a company in the British Virgin Islands between 2007 and 2012.

The FSB has cases in “sleep mode”

As soon as it became known that Maksakova had left the country and gone to Kyiv, that same evening the Russian police put her husband on the wanted list for illegally seizing an apartment in 2011.

— What can you say about the charges against your husband and you?

- Absolutely unreliable and fabricated accusations. As a member of the anti-corruption committee, my husband participated in the arrest of 15 FSB leaders. Now the FSB wants to take revenge on us.

According to her, her husband made a fortune buying and selling real estate and is being extorted by old enemies in the security service.

“The FSB has cases against many people in ‘sleep mode’ that can be used at the right time.”

I didn't have the courage

As a politician, Maksakova voted against many of the most controversial new laws, in particular the law on “homosexual propaganda” and the ban on the adoption of children by foreigners.

She also criticized the law on “insulting the feelings of believers.”

“What we considered crazy and funny in Moscow five years ago has now become absolutely normal and commonplace. We are now putting into practice ideas that were a century old. I told myself that everything would be better and that everything could be changed from the inside. Now I realized that it is very difficult to change anything. I lacked courage. I didn't feel strong enough to cut all ties."

They scream so loud that no one can see what is happening

The opera star's escape to Kyiv generated more interest last week than Donald Trump's claims that Crimea belongs to Ukraine.

“They do this on purpose. This is how propaganda is carried out. Now there is a big noise in which some cases are drowning. They scream so loudly that no one understands what is happening. Compared to what Trump says about Crimea, I am a very, very small matter.”

Diva family from the Soviet Union

Maksakova comes from a family of several famous stars.

Grandmother Maria Maksakova Sr. was one of the most famous opera stars of the Soviet Union in the thirties. Stalin's security chief Beria called her “my Carmen,” and Stalin was her great admirer.

“There were rumors that I was Stalin’s daughter,” said Maksakova’s mother, who herself became a very famous theater and film actress, and who starred in more than 25 films.

“It is incomprehensible that they now want us to go back to where we were. We didn't like the Soviet Union. Millions of people suffered under the Stalinist regime. Now Stalin has again become very popular in Russia. This is madness".

What does the Kremlin fear most?

The former Putin politician has no doubts about what the rulers in Moscow fear most:

“I think the MH-17 case is the biggest fear in the Kremlin. They know the case will never go away on its own.”

The downing of a Boeing plane in eastern Ukraine in the summer of 2014 claimed the lives of 298 people.

Maksakova emphasizes that the criminal investigation in connection with the Lockerbie case continued for 15 years, until the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi handed over the criminals and paid billions in compensation.

“As long as they are in power, they have immunity. Therefore, they will use all means to maintain power as long as possible.”

Former State Duma deputy from United Russia, ex-soloist of the Mariinsky Theater Maria Maksakova-Igenbergs, who fled to Kiev along with another Russian parliamentarian Denis Voronenkov (later shot dead, most likely by the SBU), stood up on Facebook for someone accused of taking bribes and fraud the former deputy of the former governor of the Chelyabinsk region Nikolai Sandakov, to whom the state prosecution is asking to be sentenced to 10 years in prison, will be sentenced on September 26.

Auntie sold her Motherland, and of course her intercession will only be to the detriment of Kolya of Astrakhan.

“The case of Nikolai Sandakov.

The prosecutor asked for 10 years in a maximum security colony and a huge fine!

I have no words...

Nikolai is a good and honest person, from a simple family, he achieved everything in this life, made a career with his intelligence and efficiency, did a lot of useful and controversial things, but necessary for the Russian government, and was part of this government. And no matter how offensive it may be to admit now, he worked very talentedly, brightly, as it is now fashionable to say, creatively. And what? Threw it in the trash! Nobody even stood up!

Apparently these are the last times. When one person controls another to his destruction.

Everyone who has known Nikolai for many years understands that the case is fabricated - he is simply not capable of what is being presented to him, he is a different person.

Everyone who follows his case - it is open and public - also knows that he is not guilty, they see that there is an alibi and a lot of documentary and objective evidence.

Those who initiated and “investigated” this case, who “found” in prisons witnesses against Nikolai who changed their testimony 10 times, who drew reports, selected “experts” and “witnesses,” who hid and destroyed wiretaps, also know about his innocence.

Back in 2015, high officials from Lubyanka and Staraya Square told me that the guy was innocent, that he had become hostage to a conflict of interest.

Now a person will be imprisoned for 8-9 years, saving the careers of a couple of generals - Akhrimeev and the second, I don’t remember his last name, from the Investigative Committee. They will be torn out of a family of 4 children. For what? For the “honor” of the uniform? Because a bunch of detectives, investigators, and prosecutors do not want to be held accountable for an obvious fabrication ordered by order and are saving their own skins. Because judges and prosecutors are afraid, not even of FSB generals, but of majors and lieutenant colonels. Because the rotten system is trying to justify itself.

An absolutely disgusting situation, impossible in a rule-of-law state.”, - wrote Maksakova.

Maksakova has a big connection.

Let us remember when he was detained at the Chelyabinsk airport by FSB officers. And it was Maria who petitioned to change the preventive measure for Nikolai Sandakov, giving a flattering description of Kolya Astrakhansky in court.

So what connects the traitors to the Motherland and the PR man Yurevich?

“Very unexpected details cast doubt on the initial version of how Nikolai Sandakov, accused of corruption, was detained.

So, in the political community there is active discussion about where exactly Sandakov was going to go on the day of his arrest. According to the version officially voiced by him (which, according to media reports, was adhered to by the defense of the high-ranking official), it was about a work trip to Moscow. Let us recall that Sandakov stated in court that, knowing about the attention of law enforcement agencies to him, he informed them in advance about the purposes of his trip.

Indeed, Nikolai Sandakov presented the investigation with a travel assignment in which plans to hold working meetings in the presidential administration were mentioned. But the real purpose of the trip was a wedding, according to the Ozersky Vestnik publication.

According to rumors, during a personal search of Sandakov, an invitation to the wedding of State Duma deputies Maksakova and Voronenkov was discovered. Nikolai Sandakov’s wife, Irina Vostrikova, received a similar invitation. And for this “business trip” tickets were booked in the airline’s business class, as well as a hotel worth 40 thousand rubles.

Vostrikova, in an interview with one of the Ural news agencies, said that on the day of her husband’s arrest, she was going to fly with him to Moscow for a friend’s wedding. This friend, as it turns out, was opera singer and member of the Russian parliament Maria Maksakova.

“I took time off from work and went to our friend’s wedding in Moscow, everyone in the office wished me good luck, my husband wished me good luck on a business trip. Apparently they were watching us and knew where we were going.”, - Vostrikova told Pravda UrFO, - reports"UralPolit.ru".

The scandal surrounding the sudden emigration of former Russian State Duma deputies Maria Maksakova and her husband Denis Voronenkov to Ukraine is gaining momentum. It is known that after this Maksakova, who is also an opera singer, was fired from the Gnessin Russian Academy of Music, and Voronenkov was put on the federal wanted list - he was suspected of fraud on an especially large scale. The couple have already made unflattering comments about Russia, the annexation of Crimea and Russian-Ukrainian relations.

Max Fadeev was surprised by the news about the emigration of Maria and Denis. The producer wrote a post on Instagram in which he called the spouses traitors. Max believes that no matter what your Motherland is, you should not insult it.

“Today I learned that Maria Maksakova fled the country. I can understand everything, but there is one nuance that I think is important to note. Be that as it may, no matter how much you dislike the government of your country or how much you dislike the system in which you lived today, you cannot flood your country with slop and dirt. She still gave you life, bread, upbringing, education. If you’re sick of all this and don’t like it, go wherever you want, but keep quiet! Never speak badly about your country. This is the same as talking bad about your mother. For me this is so,” said Fadeev (Spelling and punctuation hereinafter are the author’s. — Note edit.).

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instagram.com/fadeevmaxim

The producer noted that he sees many shortcomings in Russia, but still loves his country. Max said that he lived with his family abroad for 15 years, where he had a successful career and good earnings. However, he still returned to his homeland.

“Because one day, while in Paris with my family, we stopped at an intersection and Rosenbaum’s track “Let’s Raise the Cup for Our Children” started playing from the next car. And the five of us started crying. And I told my wife: “Everyone, Natasha, let’s go home.” And in 2005 I finally returned. I will do my best for my country. Even if my contribution is completely invisible from above. I will be happy if I see him. And I already see it - in my students,” the producer said.

Fadeev added that no matter what country it is, it cannot be betrayed: “Yes, she is sick, but this is the same as betraying and abandoning a sick mother.” Max is sure that Maria and Denis will not find happiness in a foreign land: “I am sure that they will not find happiness by betraying their homeland. And they will continue to wander around the world as outcasts, traitors. Because any person knows that if you managed to betray your homeland, you will also betray any other.”

Former State Duma deputy, opera singer who left for Ukraine after her husband Maria Maksakova, did not confirm the fact of her dismissal from the Gnessin Russian Academy of Music, where she taught. At the same time, her husband - Denis Voronenkov has already been put on the wanted list in Russia, and Vladimir Zhirinovsky predicts an inglorious end for the fugitives.

Earlier, Gnesinka stated that Maria Maksakova, who moved to Ukraine along with former State Duma deputy Denis Voronenkov, who was put on the federal wanted list, is still listed as a teacher at the Academy, but the issue of her dismissal will soon be resolved.

“I didn’t write a statement, I found out about it / about the proposed dismissal/ from her students,” Maksakova said in an interview with the Kommersant.FM radio station. At the same time, according to the singer, she never received money for her teaching work, since she always earned money by singing.

“My work with students is a form of Christian virtue,” the ex-deputy noted.

At the same time, the singer understands that the leadership of the Academy has legal grounds for her dismissal, although no one warned her about this, and she did not write a statement of her own free will.

“I didn’t write any statement,” she emphasized. - Probably, there will be some kind of form, for absenteeism, maybe. It's hard for me to say how they will do this. But this is all unnecessary formalization, because this is a creative process, you know? We are not turners - the whistle rang and everyone went to the factory.”

Despite the difficult situation that arose after her husband fled Russia, Maksakova said that she sees no obstacles to her visits to Russia, both on tour and for teaching, and all the talk is that some kind of sanctions could be applied to her sanctions, considers them frivolous.

Let us recall that earlier the media reported that Maksakova’s husband, former member of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Denis Voronenkov, who had already received Ukrainian citizenship, testified at the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine against the ex-president of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych in the case of allegedly committing “high treason” by him.

“Nevertheless, do you think we are in 1937? Am I a member of the family of an enemy of the people?” - Maksakova retorted in response to a journalist’s question whether she was afraid of coming to Russia.

According to Maksakova, she and her husband live in the center of Kyiv, they are not hiding from anyone, so the information that he is wanted in Russia seems strange to her. According to her, although her husband has already received Ukrainian citizenship, she is not going to give up his Russian passport.

"I have / in Ukraine/ resident card. I live, I enjoy life. What plans might I have? I sing, I work out, I have a touring schedule. Everything remains as it was,” she noted.

Neither with Maria Maksakova, nor with her agents, nor with Denis Voronenkov Federal News Agency Could not be contacted promptly. On Maksakova’s page on the social network Facebook, the last entry is dated the end of December, this is an announcement of her concert at the Mariinsky Theater. There are several snide comments under the post:

Why do you actually need a website in the Ru domain?

How is Kyiv?

Say hello to your husband, a true party member.

There are no other entries, perhaps someone is diligently cleaning up unflattering comments.

However, perhaps Maksakova and especially her husband have something to fear. This is how the leader of the LDPR commented on this scandalous story Vladimir Zhirinovsky.

“Our LDPR party never takes into its ranks or nurtures traitors,” Zhirinovsky said in a comment to the Federal News Agency. “Our deputies are all in Russia, we kicked out all potential traitors long before their possible misdeeds, and other parties picked them up, for which we paid.”

As for Denis Voronenkov, Zhirinovsky found the harshest words for his action, predicting an inglorious end for the defector, like all traitors.

“This Voronenkov is a real Vlasovite, such people have always been in the ranks of the communists,” said Zhirinovsky. - Now the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, in order to wash itself off, needs to expel from the party not only this Voronenkov, but also everyone who vouched for him when he was admitted. And all the same, this is a severe blow to this party.”

“Voronenkov himself does not have long to rejoice at the betrayal. When the government changes in Ukraine, he will still have to answer to our court,” added the LDPR leader.

What is the elite of society? Of course, these are famous artists, politicians, military men and scientists. There are many famous dynasties in Russia, known throughout the world. Among them are the Tolstoys, the Mikhalkovs, and now the Maksakovs.

But if the Tolstoys and Mikhalkovs were not noticed in any particular scandals, then the Maksakovs’ surname became the adornment of almost all tabloids and the point is not in their services to the Fatherland, but in the indecent behavior of some representatives of the famous family.
So, what will we remember the Maksakovs for?

Well, firstly, Maria Petrovna - an opera diva, People's Artist of the USSR. It was she who became the founder of the dynasty. In 1940, her daughter Lyudmila was born. The girl's father was an artist of the Bolshoi Theater. Unfortunately, he was not interested in his child and very soon left the USSR to build his career in the West.

Lyudmila Maksakova first married the well-known artist Lev Zbarsky. It was for the sake of young Lyudochka that this socialite of all Moscow abandoned the “Red Queen”, fashion model Slava Zaitsev Regina Zbarskaya.

The son of Lyudmila Maksakova will repeat the same fate. The father will never be interested in his son and will leave Russia in the same way.

What do we know about Maxim Zbarsky (Maksakov)? Nothing, except that he actively embezzled budget funds and was convicted. It was proven that Maxim Maksakov is the organizer and participant in the theft of 260,000,000 rubles from the state budget.

Agree. not the most decent biography. Now Maxim’s son, Pyotr Maksakov, is happily married to a representative of another elite family, the Yudashkins. Let's wish them happiness.

But the most famous Maksakova is the same Maria who fled from Russia to Ukraine, where misfortunes never cease to haunt her.

Sometimes we have to regret that we did not listen to our parents in time. Still, the advice of moms and dads can be priceless, but only after becoming adults and having screwed up, we begin to understand how right they were.

A striking example of the fact that one must obey one’s mother is the odious Maria Petrovna Maksakova Jr. This amazingly unlucky woman has suffered so many misfortunes that it is generally unclear how she finds the strength to live. But Maksakova herself is to blame for all her troubles, having built up a real garden of lies, vanity, an endless search for freebies and a complete lack of love in her destiny.

There is a type of woman who, like a magnet, attracts scammers, gigolos and scoundrels of all stripes. What's to blame? Maybe some specific vibes or incorrect behavior?

It seems to me that the main problem of Maria Maksakova is her mother, Lyudmila Maksakova. A beautiful, talented, but very authoritarian and cruel lady, she wished only the best for her children, but, alas, nothing came of it. The son turned out to be dishonest, and the daughter betrayed her country.

At first, Maria Maksakova lived in a civil marriage with a crime boss named Tyurin and bore him two children, then she had an affair with a jeweler with Caucasian roots - Jamil Aliyev, and then a certain Denis Voronenkov appeared in her life.

It is worth noting that the relationship between mother and daughter did not work out from the very beginning. It is very difficult to endure a mother’s difficult temperament. Lyudmila Maksakova was sharply against the relationship of her only daughter with the bandit and could not stand Voronenkova. After the murder of her son-in-law in Kiev, this lady will say: “Well, thank God. What else can we do with him? Thank God that in the end the person who was so mean... He’s a military man, he would have been shot for treason long ago.” .

The misfortunes of Maria Maksakova did not end there. After the murder of Voronenkov, she does not want or cannot return to Russia, where her children live and grow up, her relationship with her mother is ruined forever and her personal life is bursting at all the seams.
Just recently, news was published that she secretly married a young Caucasian man, who took away her Moscow apartment on Frunzenskaya Embankment, and just yesterday unknown people broke into her Kiev apartment and asked her to leave the living space she occupied with her child within 24 hours.

What else could happen in the life of Maria Maksakova to finally finish her off? What's to blame? Her boundless gullibility, as she herself claims, or her craving for shady personalities like Tyurin and Voronenkov?