By Anna Hirtenstein and Alexander Marrow
LONDON (Reuters) – A U.S.-owned company that the Kremlin seized and was under state control to provide food to the Russian army is under planning, a document seen by Reuters shows.
Canned food manufacturer Glavprodukt, the only American-owned company occupied under state control, has been arrested on the crosshairs as the U.S. and the Kremlin negotiated a war in Ukraine.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said his treatment would be part of a dialogue on resetting U.S.-Russia relations.
According to a letter reviewed by Reuters, seizures must be conducted to ensure stable production, including future supplies for the National Guard and the Ministry of Defense, and to the Russian Attorney General from the new management of Glavprodukt.
Glavprodukt, now controlled by the Russian Federation property management agency Rosimushchestvo, has been occupied from Leonid Smirnov, located in Los Angeles.
Russia's Ministry of Industry and Trade and Rosimushchestvo did not respond to requests for comment on the state's Glavprodukt plan and questions about its new administration.
Russian prosecutors accused Smirnov and the companies he controlled would move about 1.38 billion rubles ($17 million) from Russia from 2022 to 2024, the Russian Daily reported.
On March 12, the Moscow Court of Arbitration seized Gravprodut's assets at the request of the Attorney General's Office. A hearing is scheduled to be held on April 18. Smirnov denied the wrongdoing and said the lawsuit was a “Russian-style corporate raid” that stole his company.
The Attorney General did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
About 12 European companies have requisitioned their Russian subsidiaries by presidential decree, including Danish winemaker Karlsberg and Finnish utilities, the Kremlin warned that more assets have had seizures.
The Ukrainian invasion is expected to be a swift action, but the war has now been extended for more than three years, seeing Russia grow bigger and ensuring tighter control of strategic assets. In 2022, Russia competes for military supplies, including food.
Who can profit from epilepsy?
The letter reviewed by Reuters reveals who people get their harvest from the expropriation. It said Rosimushchestvo appointed Glavprodukt's new director-general at the request of food producer Druzhba Narodov.
According to a 2018 press release, Druzhba Narodov is the only supplier to the Russian National Guard for 2019-20.
A familiar with the matter said that Glavprodukt had never provided Russian troops before.
The 2018 investigation of the late opposition politician Alexei Navalny's anti-corruption fund showed that then-Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev signed Druzhba Narodov in 2017 to become the sole supplier of the National Guard.
Druzhba Narodov's ownership information is classified, but Russian newspaper Kommersant reported in 2022 that it subsequently obtained publicly information about Russia's Egrul company registry, which is named after Ni Tkachev.
Reuters cannot verify this information independently because it is now classified, but according to its website and Russia's Fileings, the alleged Agrocomplex holder and Druzhba Narodov share the same AgroComplex.ru domain name as Druzhba Narodov, according to its website and Russia's Fileings, and some email addresses.
Druzhba Narodov and Agrocomplex did not respond to requests for comment.
According to the company's independent audit documents for 2025, the ultimate owner of the holding is Alexander Tkachev, which was reviewed by Reuters.
The filings submitted to the company show that Tkachev was approved by the EU in 2014 for supporting Moscow's annexation of Crimea, and was appointed Russian Minister of Agriculture the following year and was the chairman of the board of directors of the holding company.
(The story has been corrected to award the position of Medvedev to the president's Prime Minister in paragraph 16)
(Reported by Anna Hirtenstein and Alexander Marrow in London; Editor of Elaine Hardcastle)
