Despite far-reaching sanctions, Russian elites are keeping their luxury accommodations in Spain. Parts of it have now been exposed through research.
MARBELLA – Since landing on the European Union sanctions lists, some Russian elites with relevant links to Vladimir Putin have had their property confiscated or ownership frozen. Research by the online newspaper shows that a large number of high-ranking politicians and other influential Russians were able to protect themselves Ukrainska Pravda, which has been able to locate a variety of luxury villas on the Iberian Peninsula. The de facto owners of the buildings should be located in politics as well as in the armaments and culture of Russia.
Russian politicians are bustling about on the Spanish coast
The real estate ownership of top Russian politicians is, as from the Pravda-Video on youtube can be seen, settled to a large extent on the Spanish coast. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is said to own a palatial villa in La Zagaleta, a luxury resort in Marbella, is also said to be involved. There have been reports for a long time that he owns the building in the best neighborhood between Hollywood stars and other A-celebrities. However, his name cannot be found on paper in the registration authorities – so the villa remains exempt from all sanctions by the EU states.
Putin is not the only one, because Artem Sheikin, Senator from the Amur Oblast, can also be attributed a villa in the same resort, even though the property is formally registered in the company of his ex-wife Anna Kviria. She is said to have stayed in Spain several times after the beginning of the Ukraine war and spent time in her Spanish home.
Sanctioned armaments contractors and Lavrov cavort on the Catalan coast
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov shows how EU sanctions can still be circumvented. Although he always likes to lash out at “the West” in interviews, he seems to have taken a liking to the Catalan coast. Two luxury apartments are registered to the parents of his son-in-law Alexander Vinokurov, who was among 36 businessmen invited by Putin to the Kremlin on February 24, 2022, the first day of the attack on Ukraine.
Like the extended Lavrov family, two armaments contractors are said to have chosen a suburb of Girona as their second home. However, the managing director of Rostec, a company active in the armaments industry, Sergei Chemezov, does not appear to have taken such far-reaching precautions as Lavrov, because his name can be found both in the land registry and on the EU sanctions list. Unlike Roman Pakhomov, who makes no secret of his ownership, but does not appear on any sanctions list because of his work at the officially purely civilian Rostec subsidiary “Aviation Capital Services”.
Europe hater Nikita Mikhalkov with extensive holdings in Spain
The most widespread real estate holdings acquired by a person through the work of Ukrainska Pravda was uncovered is attributed to the former filmmaker and now full-time Kremlin propagandist Nikita Mikhalkov. Not only once has he articulated his hatred of everything European in the past, but for him this does not seem to be in contradiction to extensive property ownership in Spain. A family mansion in San Roque, Cádiz province, is on paper owned equally by his wife, Tatiana, and his children, Anna, Nadezhda, and Artem.
In addition, three apartments in Alicante are registered in the land registry in the name of one of his daughters. Most opulent, however, are the buildings that Mikhalkov had registered in his own name. On the Costa Blanca, he owns several sections of real estate at a five-star hotel and the SHA wellness clinic, over which Mihalkov no longer has control because it is on the sanctions list. (sh)
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