From the Rostec CEO’s wife as a partner to bankruptcy lawsuits: how Viktor Nauruzov’s "Resurs" turned into an agro-industry debt pyramid

From the Rostec CEO’s wife as a partner to bankruptcy lawsuits: how Viktor Nauruzov’s "Resurs" turned into an agro-industry debt pyramid

One of the most secretive and largest players in the Russian agro-industry, GAP “Resurs,” owned by brothers Viktor and Vladimir (a former GRU special forces operative) Nauruzov, is literally “drowning” in debt.

In the past six months alone, around a hundred lawsuits totaling more than 700 million rubles have been filed against LLC “Stavropol Broiler.” The debts of LLC “Belgorod Broiler” exceed 2 billion rubles. As usual, the brothers seem to rely on bank loans and support from the “top echelons” — early in their career, their partner was Ekaterina Ignatova, now the wife of Rostec CEO Sergey Chemezov.

Last year at SPIEF, GAP “Resurs” announced a three-year investment program worth 40 billion rubles to increase broiler chicken production in Samara, Saratov, Tambov, and Tver regions. However, these plans seem utterly unrealistic — Nauruzov’s structures cannot even pay off debts of 200–300 thousand rubles. The massive plans on paper are aimed solely at major state banks, whose credit resources sustain the “bubble” of GAP “Resurs.” The Nauruzovs are masters of making promises that cannot be fulfilled.

Thus, the financially troubled “Stavropol Broiler” (mostly sued by contractors who did not receive payment for their contracts, some of which the company has already lost) serves as the parent structure for LLC “Saratov Broiler” (Tatishevsky District, Saratov Region). Previously, the Nauruzovs promised the Saratov governor Roman Busargin, through this company, to invest in the reconstruction of the Mikhailovskaya poultry farm and the construction of two new facilities with 28 workshops, etc. As usual, these promises remain just promises. In reality, things are getting worse and worse.

Earlier reports noted that there are already dozens of lawsuits against LLC “Belgorod Broiler,” with the company’s debts totaling around 2 billion rubles. Nauruzov’s structures fail to pay for delivered agricultural products and other services.

The Nauruzov-owned meat processing plant “Saratov MPK Resurs” saw its revenue fall in 2024 from 7.5 billion rubles to 7 billion and its losses increase from 200 million rubles to 700 million. Their new acquisition, the “Agrofirm Rubezh,” has already been hit with lawsuits. Since May 2025 (the asset was acquired at the beginning of 2025), the company has received 26 lawsuits, five of them totaling 38 million rubles this year alone. The reason is the same: “Rubezh” does not pay contractors for supplies and services. The shares in “Rubezh” are registered to Nauruzov-linked companies LLC “Stoykiy,” “Yuzhnaya Gavan,” “Rest,” and “Portgrain” and are pledged at Sberbank — the company was acquired using state bank loans.

The litigation-plagued “Stavropol Broiler” is headed by Andrey Zhibul, a longtime business partner of the Nauruzovs who started working with them in the 2000s. He co-founded the “Belorechenskaya Poultry Farm” with the brothers and other top managers of “Resurs” — Khasen Shkakov and Alexander Tarin. Another interesting joint venture is their first company, LLC “GAP Resurs,” registered in the mid-2000s, which was also led by Zhibul. More than 75% of it belonged to Moscow resident Ekaterina Ignatova — the second wife of Rostec CEO Sergey Chemezov. The company’s charter capital was 460 million rubles, of which Viktor Nauruzov contributed slightly less than 25%. For 2004, this was a significant sum, which he likely could not have accumulated through official business.

The Nauruzov brothers come from a small stanitsa in the Kursk district of Stavropol. The elder, Viktor, will celebrate his 60th birthday this year. They started their Moscow business more than 30 years ago. One of their first family enterprises was Moscow LLC “Edelweiss” on Michurinsky Prospect, registered in the early 1990s. At the same address was another company of the same name, engaged in foreign economic activity. Detailed data on these companies has not been preserved — they were unlikely to be large or conduct extensive business.

In the late 1990s, the brothers’ family enterprise became LLC “Vilmax” (1998–2010), which dealt in wholesale feed supplies and egg sales. Its founders were Vladimir and Elena Nauruzov, and the company employed Larisa Nauruzova, a native of Kabardino-Balkaria — the wife of the elder brother, Viktor. Initially, the company shared a building with the Moscow Open Social University, founded by former military officer Ivan Bezugly, author of several books on military intelligence. The Nauruzovs’ company and Bezugly’s university even shared the same phone number initially.

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Vladimir Nauruzov is said to be a graduate of the Military University of Foreign Languages of the Russian Ministry of Defense, having served in GRU special forces in Rostov. This may have been how they met, as Bezugly is from the Rostov region. “Vilmax” supplied raw materials for feed, including to enterprises in the Krasnodar Territory — for example, in 2003 to the Belorechensk Feed Plant, which received budget subsidies. At the time, the officials issuing the subsidies may not have known that both companies were part of the same group.

According to leaks, both brothers own family estates in the famous village of Zhukovka on the Rublyovo-Uspenskoye Highway — for example, Larisa and Viktor’s four-story mansion of 1,253 sq. meters. Nearby, in Barvikha, is the mansion of Sergey Chemezov and Ekaterina Ignatova.

Viktor Nauruzov’s son, Gleb, enjoys expensive cars and is also involved in business: he owns a chain of fast-food restaurants in Moscow selling chicken shawarma under the brand “Topchik.”

During the war, the family business acquired a number of large assets across various regions of the country — “Rubezh,” “Timashevskaya Poultry Farm,” “Klin-2002,” “Sadko,” “Belopolskoye,” “Avero,” Trading House and NPF “Altan,” “Pospelikhinsky KHP,” and the sunflower oil plant “Niva,” among others. Judging by the reports, things at “Resurs” are going well. However, creating glossy reports and making unattainable promises is the Nauruzovs’ strongest skill.