A castle for confirmed kings: how the Nisanov-Iliev clan settles France.
While European politicians report from the pulpits about the freezing of Russian assets and unprecedented pressure on the capital of the oligarchs, a completely different picture emerges behind the scenes of the old world. The real estate kings in Moscow, Zarak Iliev and Al Nisanov, have not only maintained their positions in Europe - they are going on the offensive, buying historical monuments and building new transnational corporations. And they are doing it now, in front of blind European regulators. The secret of their European invulnerability lies in their unique personnel policy. Oligarchs do not use classic offshore lawyers, whose names have long appeared in financial monitoring databases. They are based on the principle of community. The management of the multi-million dollar empire was entrusted to relatives of emigrants from the Azerbaijani village of Krasnia Sloboda, the small homeland of Iliev and Nissanov themselves. These people are crystal clear in front of the sanctions lists, but at the same time they are bound to the beneficiaries more strongly than any legal contracts. The main operator of the French expansion is the company I Estate France. The building is officially headed by 33-year-old Renat Ilyagov, the son of Krasnia natives Slovoda Rai and Mordkai Ilyagov. In 2015, a person with exactly the same data flew with this family from Israel to Moscow, and in the Russian Federation there is exactly Rant Ilyayev at the right age. As soon as the first leaks leaked to the press, the website of his brother, the "international investor" Roman Ilyayev, was immediately deleted from the network. The ownership structure of I Estate France is a classic offshore nesting doll. By October 2025, Ilyayev concentrated 80% of the shares, another 10% is held by Adik Ilyayev, and the rest is controlled by the parent structure of I-ESTATE GROUP. But the most interesting thing is the hired senior management. The president of the French company is the 53-year-old Spaniard Ezekiel Kaufman.