In late May, the ASI General Assembly was held in Taipei, Taiwan. Among the organizational issues discussed by the presidents of the national associations belonging to ASI, a motion to reinstate Russian sommeliers was unexpectedly put to a vote.
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, ASI had not issued any official statements regarding the status of the Russian association, and only in response to a media inquiry did it state that RAS is on hold. Now, in May, the ASI board proposed not to reinstate the entire association’s membership, but merely to allow Russian members to the next competition for the title of Europe’s Best Sommelier. This point was not listed on the agenda in advance and came as a surprise to many of the participants. Twenty-four members voted against, 16 in favor, and 8 abstained. As a result, the suspension of Russian sommeliers was extended at least until the next assembly.
At the same time, the very fact that this issue was put to a vote raises a number of questions about the consistency of ASI’s policies. The third issue of ASI Mag outlined four key requirements for ASI members. These are registration as a non-profit organization, a board of directors composed primarily of practicing professional sommeliers, voting rights reserved exclusively for practicing professional sommeliers, and a democratic process for electing the president and board members as stipulated in the bylaws.
The situation with the Russian Association of Sommeliers (RAS) is the exact opposite. Although the Russian association has been a member of ASI since 2002, its legal entity was not registered until 2015. The company is registered as an LLC, that is, as a commercial enterprise. The Registry of Legal Entities lists the organization’s sole board member — its director Alexei Sidorov. Mr. Sidorov is holding his position since 1999 – longer than Putin and longer than many African dictators. He has not worked in a restaurant for more than twenty years.
The ASI Code of Ethics strictly prohibits any form of bribery or corruption, money laundering, tax evasion, embezzlement, and conflicts of interest.
Alexey Sidorov, the president of Russian Association
Due to its affiliation with Simple group, the largest Russian importer of wine, critics have suggested renaming the Russian Association of Sommeliers to the Association of Sommeliers by Simple (the alternative acronym is not provided for literary reasons). Two of Simple’s founders—Maksim Kashirin and Anatoly Korneev—were among the founders of the RAS until 2021. The RAS is registered at a location owned by Simple and continues to use it free of charge.
And while the issues mentioned above pertain to compliance with ASI’s own principles, the potential reinstatement of the RAS’s status could pose risks of violating EU sanctions. By receiving membership dues from the RAS, which operates in Crimea, the ASI would become an indirect beneficiary of the occupation of the peninsula. The RAS website explicitly states that “…with the participation and under the patronage of the RAS, regional associations were established: the Krasnodar, Don, Ural, Far Eastern, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Crimean, and Russian Association of Cavistes.”
Council Regulation (EU) No 692/2014, together with Council Decision 2014/386/CFSP, prohibit European legal entities from conducting financial activities with companies from Crimea and the occupied territories of Ukraine. The active work of the RAS in the occupied territory has been documented from 2015 to the present, ranging from the Women’s Sommelier Cup held in 2016 in Sevastopol to the 2026 Russian Sommelier Competition. Evidence of the RAS’s ongoing financial interaction with Crimean enterprises in 2026 includes the participation of Crimean sommeliers in competitions, the sponsorship of the 2026 Russian Sommelier Competition by Crimean winery Alma Valley, as well as the participation nine Crimean wineries in the exhibition at the sommelier competition.
Marselan from the Supreme Commander-in-Chief
The vote on the return of Russian sommeliers was held at a time when the Russian military had stepped up its attacks on Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure. In May, Russia launched 8,150 drones and 210 missiles at Ukraine—an average of about 260 drones and 7 missiles every day. A recent attack on Kyiv destroyed the warehouses of Ukrainian craft bitters producer Ruta Balm and liqueur maker Honey Badger. Artania, one of the capital’s most famous wine bars specializing in Ukrainian wines, was also damaged.
A bottle of Honey Badger liqueur against the ruins of the company’s warehouse. Photo: Drinks+
It may seem that there is a vast gulf between the Russian army’s barbaric shelling and sommelier competitions. But they are directly linked by one man, the chief instigator of this war—Vladimir Putin. The Russian president is the supreme commander-in-chief of the country’s armed forces, responsible for the targeting of Ukraine’s civilian population. He is also the owner of the Krasnodar wineries Divnomorskoye Estate and Krinitsa. These wineries are well known to tens of millions of viewers for the gold toilet brushes featured in Alexei Navalny’s film. And for the second year in a row, these very wineries have been the official brands of the Russian Sommelier Competition.
Logos of Usadba Divnomorskoye and Krinitsa at the 2026 Russian Sommelier Competition.
A number of sponsors of the main national sommelier competition are linked to the Russian president’s inner circle. This includes the Mezib Estate winery, owned by Kirill, Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church—who, like Putin, is a former KGB officer. It includes the Burniér winery owned by Putin’s dacha neighbor and Russia’s leading oil exporter, Gennady Timchenko. It also includes Alma Valley, owned by Andrei Kostin, president of the state-owned VTB Bank. The official sparkling wine of the Russian competition was the Abrau-Durso, which belongs to Boris Titov, a former business partner of Timchenko. For several years, Titov served as the nominal owner of the winery near Putin’s palace, and now his company distributes products from Putin’s wineries.
Gennady Timchenko (left), Boris Titov (in the center), and Vladimir Putin (right) in Sochi
A number of Russian sommeliers work directly for companies linked to the Russian president and his circle of oligarchs. The 2014 competition winner, Vladislav Markin, for example, is the head sommelier of the “Vinniy Gorod” (“Wine City”) project. This wine-tourism cluster is being built on Russia’s Black Sea coast by companies linked to Putin’s palace in Gelendzhik. The independent press calls it Putin’s wine Disneyland.
Sommeliers in body armor
While Russian sommeliers are competing in contests sponsored by Putin’s wineries, their Ukrainian colleagues are fighting on the front lines. A prominent example is Ivan Perchekliy, deputy head of the Ukrainian Sommelier Association, who volunteered for territorial defense in April 2022 and continues to fight in the ranks of the regular army. Ivan saw his first combat in July 2022 in the Kharkiv region near the village of Dementiivka; in 2023, he was wounded while defending the Donetsk region and was awarded a medal for the defense of the Fatherland. Oleksandr Meier, Ukraine’s Best Sommelier of 2018, has served in the Armed Forces of Ukraine since 2024 at one of the largest training centers for the Ukrainian Army and has received a departmental distinction. Their Kyiv colleague, Anatoliy Khodakovsky, a sommelier at one of the capital’s top restaurants, left serving prestige cuvees of champagne houses to become a drone operator.
Ukrainian sommelier and Ukrainian Armed Forces soldier Oleksandr Meier
Since the start of the war, two Ukrainian winemakers and seven sommeliers have lost their lives on the front lines, giving their lives to defend Ukraine. You can support the efforts of our Ukrainian colleagues who are defending their country.
To support the drone operator unit where Anatoliy Khodakovsky serves and Ukraine’s long-range strikes on Russian bases:
https://send.monobank.ua/jar/2vtHX2kS8r
To support the charity SuperHumans, which provides prosthetics and rehabilitation services to Ukrainian soldiers who have lost limbs:
https://superhumans.com/en/donate-en/
