On April 6, 2018, the United States imposed extensive sanctions on Oleg Deripaska after accusations of, among other things, links to organized crime, something he firmly rejected.

His company EN + and the subsidiary Rusal were also on the sanctions list.

The same month, EN + hired the American PR agency Mercury.

The strategy for delisting En + was called the Barker plan, a plan that the Swedish government was also informed about.

It appears from internal documents from Sweden's Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Barker Plan also became the major proposal that the US Sanctions Authority later put forward.

The plan was, among other things, that Deripaska would reduce its ownership in EN + from 70 to less than 50 percent by selling shares to several different players.

Deripaska reduced its ownership to 45 percent and in January 2019, the sanctions against EN + and Rusal were abolished because he then did not have a majority of the shares.

Foundations for stray dogs

On April 8 this year, Deripaska was also on the EU sanctions list.

But EN + again escaped the sanctions.

One reason is precisely that Deripaska does not own more than 50 percent of the company.

But a closer examination shows that Deripaska has always had control over EN +, which he still has today.

In addition to Deripaska's shares, his former wife Polina Deripaska and her father in 2019 owned 6.75 percent of the shares through foundations.

Oleg and Polina Deripaska's two children owned 3.42 percent of the shares, also through foundations.

In addition, Oleg Deripaska donated just over 3 percent of his shares to a Russian charity foundation that will, among other things, take care of stray dogs, Volnoye Delo.

But that foundation was founded by Oleg Deripaska himself.

The government knew about the foundation

When the Swedish government ran the campaign for Deripaska and the aluminum group in 2018 and 2019, it was well aware of the details of the change of ownership.

A memo ahead of the then Minister of Trade Ann Linde's anti-sanctions campaign trip to the USA in January 2019 states that they are aware that Volnoye Delo was founded by Deripaska.

However, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs highlights the argument that Deripaska may not take any dividends from its own foundation.

Even today, Deripaska owns just over 50 percent of the company through foundations and family members.

"Sham solution"

Russia expert and professor Anders Åslund has been an adviser to former Russian President Boris Yeltsin and he says he knows Oleg Deripaska well.

He says that the ownership changes in EN + and Rusal were only sham transactions so that the oligarch Deripaska could retain power over the company, something the USA and Sweden are well aware of.

- What they finally came to was a sham solution that meant that Rusal was not sanctioned.

I do not think one should be worried that Rusal will be sanctioned again, he says.

"Waived majority of shares"

SVT has searched for Oleg Deripaska without result.

But a spokesperson for Rusal writes in an email that Deripaska has waived the majority of shares and control in the company in accordance with the US sanctions regulations and that he can not receive any form of financial benefit from the company.

SVT has also sought Minister of Trade and Industry Mikael Damberg for a comment - but so far without results.