Movieguide partnered with a key associate of a Russian oligarch sanctioned by the U.S.
On Feb. 7, 2014, Alexey Komov arrived in Los Angeles to speak at the 22nd Annual Movieguide Faith & Values Awards Gala — an event The New Yorker called the “Christian Oscars.” As the director of the Russian chapter of Movieguide, Komov had a special task: announcing the foreign guests in attendance. According to a now-deleted photo posted to his personal blog, he wore a black tuxedo for the occasion.
But Komov wasn’t there merely because he was interested in pursuing Christian themes in films. As emails made public by hackers and investigations by ThinkProgress have shown, Komov has played a key — perhaps the key — role in Russian efforts to infiltrate American religious right organizations.
He also has a history of praising fascists and anti-Semites, as well as working directly with some of the most notorious anti-LGBTQ voices in both the U.S. and Russia. And, perhaps most notably, he’s worked directly for a Russian oligarch, Konstantin Malofeev, who was sanctioned by both the United States and European Union for his role in helping the Kremlin try to carve up Ukraine. As the U.S. noted when sanctioning Malofeev in Dec. 2014, the oligarch “is one of the main sources of financing for Russians promoting separatism in Crimea.”
View the complete February 8 article by Casey Michel on the ThinkProgress website here.