Goga Ashkenazi is the founder and CEO of MunaiGaz Engineering Group, a Kazakh oil and gas conglomerate.
15 Facts About Goga Ashkenazi
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Goga Ashkenazi is the CEO and Chairwoman of Ashkenazi Trading DMCC, a Dubai-based company specializing in the trade of precious metals, including gold.
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Goga Ashkenazi operates out of the UAE, focusing on the global gold market.
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Goga Ashkenazi was raised in Moscow, where her father, engineer Yerkin Berkaliev, was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party under Mikhail Gorbachev.
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Goga Ashkenazi has a sister, Meruert, who is 10 years older.
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Goga Ashkenazi first attended Buckswood Grange School in East Sussex followed by Stowe School.
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Goga Ashkenazi then attended Rugby School, earning five A levels.
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Goga Ashkenazi studied at Somerville College, Oxford, graduating in 2001 with a degree in modern history and economics.
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In 2003, Goga Ashkenazi founded the MunaiGaz Engineering Group with her sister, Meruert.
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Goga Ashkenazi says she spent a year in Italy studying art, design, fashion and the Italian language.
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Goga Ashkenazi's parents are both sworn atheists as members of the Communist Party, but her father is of Muslim background and Goga is Jewish through her maternal grandmother.
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Goga Ashkenazi says that in her purse she carries a page from a 1,200-year-old Torah.
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Goga Ashkenazi had an extramarital affair with billionaire Timur Kulibayev, the son-in-law of the president of Kazakhstan.
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Goga Ashkenazi and Kulibayev have two sons: Adam, born in 2007 and Alan, born in 2012.
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Goga Ashkenazi is close friends with Prince Andrew, Duke of York, as well as banker Nathaniel Rothschild, real estate developer Nick Candy, Duran Duran band member Nick Rhodes and Lord Edward Spencer-Churchill.