Shpigel Boris Isaakovich is a Russian politician and businessman of Jewish origin. The Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz describes him as an oligarch who is "closely linked to the Kremlin."
Childhood
Where did Spiegel Boris Isaakovich start his life? His biography began quite normally, like that of millions of other Soviet citizens of the post-war generation. He was born in Ukraine, in the city of Khmelnitsky, in 1953. Boris's mother was an accountant, and his father was a sales worker. The family lived very modestly, if not poorly. Until Boris left at the age of 18, the five of them huddled together in a one-room apartment for military service, Borya with his older sister and their maternal uncle.
Strange, but despite such difficult living conditions, Shpigel Boris Isaakovich retains the brightest memories of his childhood, of his parents, especially his mother, remembers her with some special warmth. In general, such a deep mutual understanding between generations of the same family, based on an innate sense of respect for ancestors, traditions, moral standards, originating in Judaism, is characteristic of many Jewish families.
The origins of personality formation
The family in which Shpigel Boris Isaakovich grew up was not religious. However, in the town of Staro-Konstantinov, where Boris's grandparents lived, the spirit of a pre-revolutionary Jewish town has been preserved. Pensioners observed the Sabbath there, gathered for collective prayers, although there was no synagogue in the town. Boris' grandfather read and wrote in Hebrew. It was there, according to Spiegel himself, that he felt like a Jew.
Years of study and military service
After school, Boris graduated from a technical school in Khmelnitsky. Then there were two years of military service in the army, in the internal troops. He served in Lvov, and he has very good memories of the army. At the age of 19, the young soldier Boris Spiegel was accepted into the party.
After the service, he entered the Kamenetz-Podolsky Pedagogical Institute. V. P. Zatonsky, to the Faculty of History. According to him, this university had a very high level of teaching both history and political economy, which Boris was very interested in.
Spiegel recalls that during his studies he had to live in an old student dormitory, which was located in a former monastery of the 15th century, and former monastic cells served as rooms, in which 20 people were settled.
Beginning of social and labor activity
Already in his student years, Boris began to actively engage in social work. He was a member of the Khmelnitsky city committee of the Komsomol, and at the age of 22 he even became its secretary. Boris has repeatedly headed studentconstruction teams, created the student VIA Rodina, was generally an organizer by nature.
After graduating from the institute and becoming a certified economist, Boris Shpigel pursued a regular career for ten years, rising in 1990 to the position of deputy director for economics of the All-Union Research Institute of Applied Molecular Biology and Genetics. While in this position, Spiegel had full knowledge of biotechnology-related businesses, including pharmaceutical plants. This helped him a lot in choosing the direction of the business.
The beginning and turn of a business career
When it was allowed to create private enterprises in the country, our hero founded the Biotek company, which entered the Russian market as one of the distributors of medicines. In fact, at first, in the first half of the 90s, it was not a major supplier of them to the Russian market. In addition to it, there were other, more powerful firms, such as Protek.
But Boris Isaakovich chose the right and promising line of business, namely participation in public procurement of medicines for various state and departmental medical institutions. From year to year, he established and strengthened numerous acquaintances with responsible officials (for example, with State Duma Vice Speaker Gennady Seleznev), which allowed Biotek to confidently win most tenders for the supply of medicines. And when in 2005 it was decided to increase six times the volume of purchases of medicines by the state, the lion's share of this state order went to Spiegel's company, which immediately entered the top three market leaders.
Creation of FIG
Having made a fortune in the drug trade, Spiegel turned his attention to the relevant Russian enterprises. The company "Biotech" for $30 million buys out a controlling stake in the Penza plant "Biosintez" and for $20 million - the Yoshkar-Ola vitamin plant "Marbiopharm". The first venture is generally strategic for Spiegel's company. After all, she has been purchasing his products since its inception.
No wonder from 2003 to 2013, Boris Isaakovich, at the suggestion of the governor, represented the Penza region in the Federation Council of the Russian Federation. Here he actively fought against the tightening of state control over the certification of medicines. And he succeeded.
In March 2013, Boris Shpigel resigned from the Federation Council. Today he officially holds the position of Chairman of the Board of Directors of Biotek.
Community activities
He has been Deputy Chairman of the Russian Renaissance Party since 2002. In 2010, he founded World Without Nazism, an organization with close ties to the Russian government and formed to assert the Russian version of history, in particular in relation to the inclusion of the B altic states into the USSR and the Holodomor. This was followed by the creation of the Commission of the Russian Federation to counter attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests in 2012.
The World Without Nazism organization is mentioned in the Estonian Security Police's annual review as a propaganda organization aimed at promoting the "Soviet approach to World War IIwar." She works closely with the Finnish Anti-Fascist Committee.
Spiegel is also chairman of the World Congress of Russian Jewry (WCRJ), an organization that, according to The Jewish Chronicle, works on behalf of the Kremlin despite its nominal independence. In 2008, during the war in South Ossetia, he accused Georgia of committing genocide while acting as president of the WCGR, which drew criticism from Israeli members of Congress.
Political credo of public figure Boris Spiegel
Jewish media write that he is a firm follower of Putin's policies. During the fighting in the Caucasus in 2008, he joined the Kremlin's propaganda campaign, calling for the creation of a tribunal that would investigate "Georgian war crimes" and "genocide".
Spiegel accused the countries that were previously part of the communist bloc (with the exception of Russia and Belarus) of "rapid nazification". He also criticizes "Western European democracies" for allegedly their role in unleashing World War II. Spiegel proposes to make a common history textbook for all of Europe based on "serious scientific research", as well as the decisions of international judicial and political authorities, on the basis of which the post-war world order was built.
He is one of the few Russian politicians who openly proclaim himself an adherent of Judaism. On his initiative, monuments were erected in the Israeli city of Netanya in honor ofRed Army soldier.
Scandals surrounding the name of Boris Spiegel
What attracts high-profile scandalous stories to such a person as Shpigel Boris Isaakovich. The photo below shows that he openly emphasizes his commitment to the canons of Judaism. This causes in many irritation and even hatred. On the Web, materials discrediting him were repeatedly distributed. So, it was reported that Shpigel Boris Isaakovich, whose criminal record allegedly dates back to the early 80s, was accused of sexual harassment of minors. A copy of the verdict with a sentence of three years in prison even appeared on the Web. This fake was quickly exposed, but the sediment, as they say, remained, which, apparently, was what the organizers of this action were trying to achieve.
In January 2011, Spiegel was the subject of media attention when he was robbed of $280,000 in cash in his hotel room.
Another scandal also made a big noise, in which Spiegel Boris Isaakovich was also mentioned. Shortly after the birth of his son, his daughter, married to singer Nikolai Baskov, divorced him, and the latter was simply put out of Spiegel's house, and he was simply forbidden to see his son.
Spiegel Boris Isaakovich: personal life
In connection with the election of our hero as a senator, he was accused of illegally combining civil service with business. How did Spiegel Boris Isaakovich act in this case? his wifewas declared the owner of the shares of the Biotek company with an income of more than 100 million rubles. per year, and our hero allegedly remained to live on one salary. But after Spiegel left the Federation Council, this scheme apparently became no longer needed, and the wife probably simply returned his shares to her husband so that he could return to the management of the company without hindrance.
His daughter Svetlana, after a divorce from Baskov, married a major Ukrainian government official. She already has two sons: Bronislav and David.
