The tough sanctions are getting to the heart of the Russian oligarchs. Bank accounts were frozen and assets confiscated. The oligarchs try everything to protect their belongings. As a result, more and more Russian superyachts have recently disappeared without a trace.
As the British newspaper “Observer” reports, the owners rely on a simple trick. By turning off the tracking of their yachts, the luxury ships become invisible to global tracking systems. At least six superyachts whose owners are on the British sanctions list are said to have disappeared from the radar.
Oligarchs want to prevent confiscation
Most of the yachts were last spotted in the Maldives. The Indian Ocean country has no extradition treaty with the United States.
The German news magazine “Focus” has listed the six missing yachts. The £240million yacht ‘A’ was last spotted in the Maldives on March 10. The owner Andrey Melnichenko (50) has already lost one of his expensive ships. His 143-meter sailing yacht was confiscated in Italy in March.
Luxury yacht belonging to Russia’s second richest person resurfaced
The 72-meter-long yacht “Clio” belonging to the industrial giant Oleg Deripaska (54) has not been found since April 18. The “Alfa Nero” of the entrepreneur Andrey Guryev (62) was last located on March 3 in the Caribbean. Since March 2, the 70-meter-long “Galactica Super Nova” by Vagit Alekperov (71) has disappeared off the Croatian coast. The 140-meter-long “Ocean Victory” by Viktor Rashnikov (73) has been missing since March 1st. Igor Kesaev’s “My Sky” (55) disappeared on March 30 in the Maldives.
With the “The Pacific”, a superyacht that has been missing since the beginning of May has recently reappeared in safe waters off Turkey. Before that, it was last localized off the Canary Islands off the west coast of Africa. The $150 million yacht belongs to Novatek boss and oligarch Leonid Mikhelson (66), the second richest man in Russia. Mikhelson was sanctioned by Britain in early April. Turkey has been a popular destination for the oligarchs’ superyachts since the West imposed sanctions. (smt)