Valeriya Novodvorskaya was gifted 40 thousand dollars for her birthday, and she gave all the money to journalists
Businessman Alfred Koch told about this story in an interview with Yuri Dud.
Valeriya Novodvorskaya during a protest in Moscow against Russia's intervention in Ukraine in March 2014. Photo: Sasha Mordovets/Getty Images
A native of Kazakhstan and of German descent, Alfred Koch began his political career in St. Petersburg — alongside Sobchak, Putin, Chubais and numerous local criminal authorities, supported the democratic movement in Russia, financed Boris Nemtsov and the Anti-Corruption Foundation. He was also friends with politician Valeriya Novodvorskaya.
"What do you think about Valeriya Novodvorskaya? Was there any rethinking of her views?" asked Yuri Dud, hinting that Novodvorskaya had immediately warned about Putin's danger.
"I had no rethinking; I immediately considered her a great woman. I always helped her; we had a very tender relationship. She was some kind of phenomenon, unearthly, 'not one of us'. A person who was completely devoid of any base desires, not of this world. Once, I gave her money, I think for her 60th birthday, a substantial sum — 40 thousand dollars. She gave them to journalists of 'Novoye Vremya' magazine."
I yelled at her, saying, "Lera, what are you doing?" "You're a disabled woman, with an elderly mother, and you're supporting healthy men who can't feed themselves?" "I can't, they are my comrades," Alfred Koch recounted.
"Everything she said about Putin back then, was it clear at the time, or did it become clear in retrospect?" — Dud asked
"At the time, I thought she was overreacting; the direction was right, but she was overreacting. Now it doesn't seem that way." "Putin reached her level; he didn't reach it then, but he has now. She set the bar, and he reached it," Koch added.
Valeriya Ilyinichna Novodvorskaya was born in Baranavichy in 1950, when her parents were on holiday with her grandparents. Already in 1969, she organized an underground group in Moscow to fight the communist regime. She was arrested and sentenced to three years. Later, she was repeatedly persecuted by Soviet authorities. In 1992, she founded the party 'Democratic Union'. Later, she founded the party 'Western Choice'. She was an uncompromising critic of the Russian authorities and Vladimir Putin. She died in July 2014.
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