Foreign Minister Baiba Braže has decided to designate Russian citizen Sergei Fedotov, the father of politician Jūlija Stepaņenko, as an undesirable person (persona non grata) and ban him from entering Latvia for an indefinite period.
The decision was taken in accordance with Section 104, Paragraph three, Clause 1 of the Immigration Law, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reports.
Sergei Fedotov, the father of politician Jūlija Stepaņenko (SV/J), and his company Forma ZhBI have provided material support to Russian forces fighting in Ukraine for several years. As early as 2022, the company produced anti-tank barriers and stoves, while Fedotov later donated a vehicle to a foundation involved in supplying Russian troops, LETA has established.
Fedotov confirmed in an interview with The Insider that he is Stepaņenko’s father. His substantial gifts to the politician have previously been reported, while Stepaņenko declined to explain their origin. Fedotov told the publication that after travel restrictions were imposed, he transferred his apartment in Riga to his daughter.
In November 2022, the newspaper 41+ Solnechnogorsk (41+ Солнечногорск) reported that Forma ZhBI, together with KROST, had begun producing so-called “dragon’s teeth”. In a article on the 6th of December, Fedotov himself confirmed his readiness to continue providing assistance: “If additional help is needed to produce another batch, we are always ready to take part.”
He said the company was capable of producing more than 150 concrete structures per day.
Fedotov also explained his company’s involvement in manufacturing stoves. Partners prepared the drawings, while his company prepared the metal and assembled the stoves.
In Moscow, they were additionally fitted with grates and chimneys. “The finished products are then sent to the front,” Fedotov said.
The same article reported that 2,000 defensive fortifications and approximately 50 stoves had been produced within a month. The concrete barriers were sent to Russia’s Belgorod region and Russian-occupied territories in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
In an October 2024 article, Alexei Shashkin, a representative of the Valour (Доблесть) foundation,
named Fedotov among the businesspeople helping prepare shipments for delivery to the war zone.
The newspaper reported that Fedotov donated a GAZ Sobol vehicle worth one million roubles to the foundation. Russian combat units, including BARS, have also received shipments from the foundation.
An earlier family company, Forma-Stroy, in which Fedotov owned a 60% stake and Stepaņenko’s half-sister Anna Makarovskaya held 10%, also received military-related contracts.
The STAR database contains a 2015 contract for the supply of sand to a military unit worth 48,000 roubles. In 2016–2017, the company signed three contracts worth approximately 3.27 million roubles with the NIID engine research institute, including work on the reconstruction of a diesel engine production facility. One contract worth approximately 1.76 million roubles concerned adapting the facility for the serial production of diesel engines.
The Moscow Region construction assessment register states that the project was financed from Russia’s federal budget.
NIID was added to the European Union sanctions list on the 20th of May, 2025
as a supplier to the Russian Ministry of Defence supporting Russia’s military-industrial complex. Forma-Stroy’s contracts were concluded before the sanctions were imposed. Forma-Stroy was merged into Forma ZhBI in 2019.
In total, Checko lists seven contracts between Forma-Stroy and public-sector customers worth approximately 6.5 million roubles. Official registers for 2015 and 2016 also confirm subsidies totalling 4.88 million roubles for the purchase and leasing of equipment.
Fedotov’s Forma complex has also been visited by Viktor Bout, the illegal arms dealer dubbed the “Merchant of Death”, who was sentenced to 25 years in prison in the United States and returned to Russia in a prisoner exchange in 2022.
In a report published on the 2nd of August this year, television channel 360 covered Bout and State Duma MP Valery Seleznyov meeting employees at the complex. A representative of Russia’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) thanked Fedotov for showing them around the facility. The party’s report also mentioned honouring the families of military personnel involved in the war.
Stepaņenko has declined to disclose details about her father’s company to Latvian Television, citing a desire to protect her family. In interviews with other media outlets, the politician has stressed that she will neither disown nor turn away from her father.
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