Putin Ally's Social Media Rants Tied to Wine Shipments from Italy

Controversial posts on social media by Dmitry Medvedev, Russia's former president and prime minister, have followed the dates of his wine shipments from Italy, a Russian investigative news outlet has reported.

Medvedev, now deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, has made headlines throughout the war in Ukraine for regular social media rants that have ranged from calls for nuclear strikes on NATO members to suggestions that Moscow has no choice but to eliminate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

A report by Russian news site the Insider, published on Friday, connects the former Russian president's anti-NATO rants on his Telegram channel to shipments of alcohol from Italy.

"As it turns out, despite the sanctions, wine continues to be supplied to Russia from Medvedev's Italian vineyards, and the delivery dates each time surprisingly precede his scandalous publications," the publication said.

Medvedev has continued to receive shipments of alcohol from Tuscan winery Fattoria della Aiola, which was in 2017 registered with an offshore company in Cyprus owned by Ilya Eliseev, a former classmate and close friend of the official. The Insider noted that the winery's ownership structure has since changed, but part of the shares still belong to Eliseev.

After Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Medvedev continued to receive wine from this Italian winery, The Insider reported. It said that wine from Fattoria della Aiola arrived in Russia on June 17, 2022.

Two days later, Medvedev wrote a post on Telegram alluding to the demise of the European Union before Ukraine is able to become a member.

"Perhaps we would have Communism, if the [Soviet] Union had been preserved. But, unfortunately, the union died. Understand what I'm getting at?" he wrote. "So what if (knock on wood) the EU disappears by then? it's scary to imagine the scandal that would arise."

"Because what sacrifices have been made on the altar of joining the EU and what a disappointment to the expectations of the unfortunate Ukrainians?" he added.

A month later, on July 18, 2022, Medvedev received another shipment from the winery. Three days after that, he published a lengthy list on Telegram detailing the "sins" of the West, calling Europeans "fools" and describing U.S. President Joe Biden as a "grandfather with dementia."

And in October 2022 and January 2023, Medvedev published more social media rants days after receiving wine shipments from Italy, The Insider found.

The former Russian president has warned on multiple occasions that a nuclear war could break out amid the conflict in Ukraine.

In January, he warned in a post on his Telegram channel that should Ukraine attack missile launch sites on Russian soil using long-range missiles provided by the West, Moscow could respond with a nuclear strike.

Attacks by Ukraine risk infringing paragraph 19 of Russia's 2020 nuclear doctrine, Medvedev said, adding that all those who support Kyiv "should remember this."

The paragraph states that Russia could use nuclear weapons to respond to an attack using nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction, or to the use of conventional weapons against Russia "when the very existence of the state is put under threat," Reuters reported.

"This is not a right to self-defense, but a direct and obvious basis for our use of nuclear weapons against such a state," wrote Medvedev.

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