Rustam Minnikhanov

In November 1996 Minnikhanov was appointed minister of finance of the Republic of Tatarstan.

From July 10, 1998, until March 25, 2010, Minnikhanov was prime minister of the Republic of Tatarstan.[1]

As prime minister, he was known for his enthusiasm for technological innovation, spearheading the republic's move to digital, paperless government and the streamlining of official business through the use of electronically distributed documents and electronic signing of official documents.[2]

On January 27, 2010, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev nominated Minnikhanov to be the new president of Tatarstan[3] and on March 25, 2010, Minnikhanov formally assumed the office of President.[4] His ceremony was presented on Channel One Russia by Maxim Sharafutdinov.

Russian President Vladimir Putin meeting with pro-Russian representatives of the Crimean Tatars, 16 May 2014

During the 2014 Crimean crisis, Minnikhanov acted as a mediator between the Kremlin government and the Crimean Tatar community over concerns raised amongst Crimean Tatars over potential persecution by Russia should it annex the peninsula.[5] On 5 March Minnikhanov signed an agreement on co-operation between Tatarstan and the Aksyonov government in Crimea that implied collaboration between ten government institutions as well as significant financial aid to Crimea from Tatarstan businesses.[5] On 11 March Minnikhanov was in Crimea on his second visit and attended as a guest in the Crimean parliament chamber during the vote on the declaration of sovereignty pending 16 March referendum.[5] The Tatarstan Mufti Kamil Samigullin invited Crimean Tatars to study in madrasas in Kazan, and declared support for their "brothers in faith and blood".[5]

Following news of Crimea's independence referendum organized with the help of Russia on 16 March 2014, the Kurultai leadership voiced concerns of renewed persecution, as commented by a U.S. official before the visit of a UN human rights team to the peninsula.[6] At the same time, Minnikhanov was dispatched to Crimea to quell Crimean Tatars' concerns and to state that "in the 23 years of Ukraine's independence the Ukrainian leaders have been using Crimean Tatars as pawns in their political games without doing them any tangible favors". The issue of Crimean Tatar persecution by Russia has since been raised regularly on an international level.[7][8] On 18 March, the day Crimea was annexed by Russia, and Crimean Tatar was de jure declared one of the three official languages of Crimea. It was also announced that Crimean Tatars will be required to relinquish coastal lands on which they squatted since their return to Crimea in the early 1990s and be given land elsewhere in Crimea. Crimea stated it needed the relinquished land for "social purposes", since part of this land is occupied by the Crimean Tatars without legal documents of ownership.[9] The situation was caused by the inability of the USSR (and later Ukraine) to sell the land to Crimean Tatars at a reasonable price instead of giving back to the Tatars the land owned before deportation, once they or their descendants returned from Central Asia (mainly Uzbekistan). As a consequence, some Crimean Tatars settled as squatters, occupying land that was not legally registered.

On 20 April 2017 Minnikhanov was Putin's envoy to meet with candidate Ebrahim Raisi in Mashhad in Raisi's capacity as Head of Astan Quds Razavi. MP Alireza Rahimi questioned the meeting and asked for explanations about the reasons for it, citing alleged Russian interference in 2016 U.S. election. “The recent meeting raises the suspicion of interference in the elections, which is not appropriate”, he said.[10][11] According to the official Islamic Republic News Agency, Minnikhanov also met vice president Eshaq Jahangiri in Tehran one day earlier, discussing bilateral relations.[12]

On 18 March 2022 Minnikhanov met and awarded 2022 European figure skating champion and provisional 2022 Olympic gold medallist Kamila Valieva a “Duslyk” order and to her mother Alsu Valieva a medal of “100 years of the Establishment of TASSR”.

In response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States Department of the Treasury added Minnikhanov to the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List on 26 January 2023, which results in his assets being frozen and U.S. persons being prohibited from dealing with him.[17]