Queen’s cousin Prince Michael of Kent ‘selling access to Putin for $18,000 a day’

A senior member of the British royal family is allegedly selling privileged access to Vladimir Putin’s regime to business clients.

Queen Elizabeth II greets Prince Michael of Kent, rear, and Princess Michael of Kent. The Prince has been accused of selling access to Russian President Vladminir Putin.

A senior member of the British royal family is allegedly selling privileged access to Vladimir Putin’s regime to business clients, an undercover investigation has found.

Prince Michael of Kent, the Queen’s cousin, was covertly filmed at a business meeting in which prospective clients were told he could be hired for £10,000 ($AUD17,800) a day to make representations to the country’s leadership.

The prince confirmed he would give the clients’ company his royal endorsement in a recorded speech for a $US200,000 ($AUD255,000) fee and was happy to use his home in Kensington Palace as the backdrop to impress the company’s investors.

The disclosures in a joint investigation by The Sunday Times and Channel 4’s Dispatches will prove highly controversial because Russia is regarded as the top threat to Britain’s security. The Kremlin is subject to western economic sanctions after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the 2018 chemical-weapon poisonings in Salisbury and a string of apparently state-sponsored cyberattacks.

The prince’s friend and business partner of 30 years, the Marquess of Reading, told undercover reporters at the meeting that the prince was able to take advantage of his role as “Her Majesty’s unofficial ambassador to Russia” to gain access to the “Putinistas” – the decision-makers in the Kremlin.

Reading added that Michael’s relationship with the president had not been harmed by the attacks on the West because it was “above all the political turmoil” and the prince was regarded as a “friend of Russia”.

The marquess warned that the prince’s services were “confidential”. He said: “We’re talking relatively discreetly here because we wouldn’t want the world to know that he is seeing Putin purely for business reasons.”

The prince had said earlier that he was “very excited” to take up a role helping the prospective clients’ business in Russia. He talked about how he had been given one of the Kremlin’s most prestigious awards, the Order of Friendship, and said his connections in Russia could “bring some benefit”.

The Prince and Princess Michael of Kent at a film premiere. Picture: AFP

The prince was discussing his connections in Russia with two reporters pretending to be representatives of a South Korean gold investment company called House of Haedong, which was seeking access to the Kremlin to boost business in the country.

The prince and the marquess were filmed as part of an investigation which was looking into allegations that members of the royal family were trading on their links to the Queen for personal profit. Leaked documents show that an event at Kensington Palace in 2013 – held under the joint patronage of the prince and Putin – was being used by the marquess to sell access to the Russian leader. One document, sent by the marquess, outlined how sponsors would be given “opportunities for building relations with senior Russian political and business leaders, including personally meeting President Vladimir Putin”.

The investigation will intensify

concern that the Queen’s relatives risk damaging the monarchy’s reputation by exploiting their royal position for cash.

Michael, 78, has represented the Queen but does not receive funding from the sovereign grant.

The Duchess of Sussex drew attention to Michael’s commercial status in court documents last year to argue that there was a precedent for royals earning money in the private sector while retaining royal status. While Prince Harry was stripped of his personal security and honorary military posts, Michael has retained both.

HRH Prince Michael of Kent.

Last week Marina Litvinenko, the widow of the Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko, said Putin’s regime had assassinated her husband and it was “grotesque” that a member of the royal family should try to make money from access to Russia’s leaders. “Conducting any business with Vladimir Putin’s regime is inappropriate,” she said. “It shows you don’t care about human rights, democracy, the people who are dying in Russia or what he did to your own citizens on UK soil.”

The Conservative MP Bob Seely, a member of the foreign affairs committee, said Prince Michael was damaging UK interests by dealing with the regime. “No one, regardless of their rank, should be selling private, privileged access to the Russian leadership,” he said.

In a statement the prince said last week that he did not have a “special relationship” with Putin. This contradicted claims by the marquess, which had been made while he was negotiating fees with the undercover reporters on the prince’s behalf.

Russian President Vladmir Putin with then-British Prime Minister David Cameron in 2012.

The statement said the prince had not been in contact with Putin or his office for almost 18 years. It added: “Lord Reading is a good friend who, in trying to help, made suggestions that Prince Michael would not have wanted, or been able, to fulfil.”

Last week the marquess issued a statement saying he had “overpromised” during the meeting with the undercover reporters and he was “truly regretful”.

The Sunday Times