Kevin Calvey, was chairman of Oklahoma House Tax and Revenue Committee, in 2005 and 2006, when key legislation was implement to facilitate, tax credit counterfeiting and laundering.

Kevin Calvey's brother cofounded firm with former KGB head as adviser
Kevin Calvey's brother is leader in a Russian private equity firm with former KGB head as adviser.
The Oklahoman, August 8, 2010
John Estus and Chris Casteel

08/08/2010 Congressional candidate Kevin Calvey's campaign has collected more than $270,000 tied to international business interests, particularly in Russia. View

08/08/2010 Kevin Calvey Campaign donors at a glance. View

Kevin Calvey's brother, Michael, is a co-founder and senior partner in a Russian private equity firm that has a former director of the Soviet KGB as its adviser.

Baring Vostok Capital Partners has become one of Russia's largest private equity firms since it began investing there after the fall of the Soviet Union.

Investors in Baring Vostok's funds include pension funds, the Government of Singapore Investment Co., the World Bank, several endowments of U.S. universities and others.

Among the firm's advisers is Vadim V. Bakatin, the final director of the Soviet KGB who dismantled the infamous spy agency and played a major role in Russia's transition from Communist rule to a free-market republic.

Kevin Calvey said he can't remember if he's ever met Bakatin, who was chosen to lead the KGB in 1991 after his predecessor was removed following a coup attempt against former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.

Bakatin, a longtime Soviet law enforcement official who had no previous experience with the KGB, led the agency for about three months. He is credited with softening the Soviet spy agency by ending many of the practices it had become notorious for, such as spying on citizens and ousting Soviet dissidents.

Bakatin gave a speech at the University of Oklahoma in 2003 about foreign policy. Also speaking were James Baker and Madeleine Albright, former U.S. secretaries of state.

Other Baring Vostok advisers include cosmonaut Alexi Leonov, the first man to walk in space, two former U.S. ambassadors to Russia and former U.S. astronaut Thomas Stafford, an Oklahoma native and Kevin Calvey campaign donor.

Leonov and Stafford worked together on the famed Apollo-Soyuz space mission, the first meeting in space between Americans and Soviets.

"They're all very experienced individuals," Michael Calvey said. "They have all, to some extent, given reassurance to a number of our investors about economic and political trends in Eastern Europe and Russia. They also have advised us about similar issues."

Baring Vostok advisers are not involved in day-to-day operations or investments.

They deal mostly with advising investors on economic or political trends and the investment climate, Michael Calvey said.

In the past 16 years, Baring Vostok has invested more than $1.2 billion in more than 50 companies, including oil and gas, telecommunications, advertising, forestry, engineering, financial services, mineral water and more. Many have since become among the most successful corporations in Russia and Central Asia.