# Crocus Group **Crocus Group** is [[Aras Agalarov]]'s Moscow development company — owner of Crocus City Mall, the Crocus Expo trade center and the Crocus City Hall concert venue. The venue is where the Trump–Agalarov relationship began in 2013, and where one of the deadliest terror attacks in modern Russian history took place in 2024. ## Miss Universe 2013 Crocus City Hall opened on October 25, 2009. From November 5 to 9, 2013 it hosted the Miss Universe pageant, which Donald Trump attended. That month Putin awarded Agalarov the Order of Honour, and a Trump-branded tower in Moscow — with Sberbank to finance 70% — was discussed (see [[Trump Tower Moscow]]). Wikipedia states Agalarov paid Trump $20 million to stage the event, a figure that may conflate the pageant's cost with Trump's fee *[treat with care]*. Crocus also built two stadiums for the 2018 World Cup. The relationship led, three years later, to [[Emin Agalarov]] arranging the [[Trump Tower Meeting June 2016]] through publicist [[Rob Goldstone]]. ## The Crocus City Hall attack On the evening of March 22, 2024, four gunmen — Tajik citizens — attacked a concert at Crocus City Hall, killing 151 people and injuring 609. The [[Islamic State]]'s Khorasan branch (ISIS-K) claimed responsibility. The U.S. Embassy had issued a public warning on March 7. Putin and FSB director [[Alexander Bortnikov]] nonetheless suggested Ukrainian and Western involvement without evidence; [[Belarus]]'s [[Alexander Lukashenko]] offered an account that contradicted the Ukraine claim. The trial began on August 4, 2025. On March 12, 2026 the four gunmen and 11 accomplices were sentenced to life; four others received terms of up to 22.5 years. The concert hall will not be restored; a memorial opened on March 22, 2025. ## RWKB angle The same building links the origin of the Trump–Agalarov business relationship to a Kremlin disinformation episode that tried to pin an ISIS attack on Ukraine. ## See Also - [[Aras Agalarov]] - [[Keith Schiller]]