Spain seizes a yacht from a Russian oligarch in Barcelona

A yacht belonging to a Russian oligarch was immobilized on Monday in Barcelona (northeastern Spain) as part of sanctions against Russia following the invasion of Ukraine, the head of the Spanish government, Pedro Sánchez, announced to the La Sexta network.

“Today we seized, technically temporarily immobilized, a yacht from one of the main oligarchs,” Sanchez said.

He added that it is a yacht “around 140 million dollars (128 million euros)” and 85 meters in length. He added that “more will come”, without giving further details.

According to the Spanish newspaper El Pais, this is the yacht “Valerie”, which would be related to Sergei Chemezov, head of the Russian defence industry conglomerate Rostec, and ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Sergei Chemezov is on the lists of Russian tycoons sanctioned by the United States and the United Kingdom since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The Western response includes the seizure of bank accounts, mansions and luxury ships of Russian tycoons.

In recent days, yachts were also confiscated in France and Italy.

One valued at between 100 and 120 million euros (from 109 million to 131 million dollars), the “L'Amore Vero”, was seized last Thursday in La Ciotat (southern France).

Italy announced on Saturday that it froze some 140 million euros of assets of Russian oligarchs, including two yachts.

This is the “Lady M”, worth 95 million euros (104 million dollars) and belongs to the steel magnate Alexei Mordashov, close to Putin and subject to EU sanctions, and the “Lena” (50 million euros, 54 million dollars), owned by Gennady Timshenko.

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