You didn’t ask, but I’ll repeat it: Vladimir Ashurkov lied in his affidavit regarding the “Navalny card.” That testimony underpins the defense line for Zheleznyak, Leontiev, and Lomov—a defense against recovery of the stolen funds.
And here’s a quote from an article dated roughly May–June 2012, reprinted on the Banki.ru website, originally published by Slon:
The bank that, according to Navalny’s plan, was initially supposed to be the partner in the co‑branded card project is one of the banks of the Life group, built around Probusinessbank (the group develops its federal retail through the “Poidyom!” bank). Navalny said this himself at a closed lecture on April 24 at the New Economic School, according to a participant quoted by Slon. One of the presentation slides was devoted to a co‑branded card with the group’s logo.
But on the official announcement day, May 15, Probusinessbank’s chairman Alexander Zheleznyak denied the existence of any joint project.
“All I know about Navalny is that such a person exists, nothing more. Perhaps at the level of mid‑level staff someone spoke with him about issuing cards, but nothing of this kind was brought to my attention as the first person. If it had reached such a stage and there were a project, I would have known,” he told Slon. Despite the lack of reliable confirmation, information about the partnership leaked to the media and was published by GQ. After that, the bank issued an official denial stating that the information not only did not correspond to reality, but also harmed the group’s reputation. In short, the shareholders did not want to tie their banks to political projects. The Probusinessbank website states that it develops independently of political parties and movements.
Alexander Lebedev, chairman of the board of directors of National Reserve Corporation:
— We expressed interest in issuing co‑branded cards via National Reserve Bank, but I don’t yet have a formal proposal. We discussed the matter in principle: I was asked in advance how I would view it, and I asked to be shown how well it had been worked out. If these cards help popularize the fight against corruption, then for civil society that would be a good thing. As I understand it, the project was originally done with another bank, and then something stalled. I see no political risks, since support for Navalny’s foundation is support for the anti‑corruption efforts of Putin and Medvedev.