Nicole Kidman, Penelope Cruz, Uma Thurman, Kate Winslet.
And Anastasia Ignatova?
In 2017, Ignatova was the only nonactor and noncelebrity to be featured in the Italian tire company Pirelli's arty annual calendar, appearing alongside the Hollywood stars listed above and others including Alicia Wikander, Julianne Moore, Helen Mirren, and Leya Seydoux.
Little-known to the public in Russia or beyond, Ignatova is the stepdaughter of Sergei Chemezov, head of the massive state conglomerate Rostec -- maker of weapons used in Russia's war on Ukraine -- and a longtime confidant of President Vladimir Putin.
The European Union is now citing Ignatova's inclusion in the calendar as a piece of evidence supporting its refusal to scrap sanctions it imposed on her in April 2022 over the invasion of Ukraine, RFE/RL's Russian investigative unit, Systema, has found.
Ignatova is fighting the sanctions in EU court, arguing she does not benefit from the sprawling assets controlled by her stepfather Chemezov, who has been under EU sanctions since 2014 for undermining Ukraine's territorial integrity.
'The Only Plausible Reason'
The Council of the European Union disagrees.
In a draft of a letter to Ignatova's lawyers that was obtained by Systema, the council pointed to the calendar as one of several pieces of evidence that she draws advantages from her relationship to Chemezov.
A partnership in place at the time between Pirelli and Rostec was "the only plausible reason" for Ignatova's inclusion in the calendar, the letter said. It said her inclusion "[sheds] light on the close link" between her and Chemezov.
The calendar usually features "famous people belonging to…global show business and surely not university teachers," it said.
On the website of the calendar, Ignatova was described as a professor of political theory at Moscow State University and a "special guest" whom the photographer, Peter Lindbergh, had met in 2015.
Systema sought comment from Ignatova and Pirelli, but neither responded immediately to the requests.
The European Union agreed this month to extend visa bans and asset freezes on Ignatova and more than 2,600 other people and entities until mid-March 2026.
Putin And Chemezov In Dresden
In the draft letter obtained by Systema, the EU Council pointed to what it said were three assets that provide evidence Ignatova has benefitted from her relationship with Chemezov: a Belize-based company called Elsamex; a villa in Marbella, Spain; and a $130 million superyacht, Valerie, which Ignatova's lawyers said has been sold. The EU Council expressed doubt about that assertion.
Ignatova, 38, is the daughter of Chemezov's wife, Yekaterina Ignatova, from her first marriage. She received a master's degree in political science from the Moscow State Institute for International Relations in 2013 and has given lectures there. She has co-authored a monograph on "state policy in the sphere of high technology," on which Chemezov is identified as the editor.
In 2017, Ignatova became the director of a company called Farmapt, which a commercial registered indicates has no other employees. She is also involved in a company that owns property in Moscow valued in 2020 at $7 million.
Chemezov, 72, has been CEO of Rostec since 2007. He has been close to Putin since their time as Soviet KGB officers stationed in Communist East Germany in the 1980s, when they lived in the same apartment building in Dresden. In 1996, when Putin became President Boris Yeltsin's deputy chief of staff, he made Chemezov head of the Kremlin's foreign economic relations department.
Chemezov has supported the invasion of Ukraine and echoed Putin's narratives in public comments, accusing the United States and its Western allies of provoking the conflict and saying they risked triggering a global war.
