The United States imposes sanctions on the yacht company that targets Russian elites

WASHINGTON – The US government has imposed sanctions on a yacht management company and its owners, describing them as part of a corrupt system that allows Russian elites and the president Vladimir Putin get rich, the Treasury Department announced Thursday.

Imperial yachtsbased in Munich and controlled by Evgeniy Kochman, born in Moscow, it is aimed at the Russian oligarchs.

The Treasury Department said Kochman and his company provide yacht-related services to “Russian elites, including those in President Putin’s inner circle.”

Imperial Yachts, the department said, does business with at least one person subject to sanctions.

Also identified the Department of the Treasury four yachts linked to Putin: Shellest, Nega, Graceful and Olympia.

The department said Putin used the Nega to travel to northern Russia and Shellest regularly visits his Black Sea palace.

The department said Putin has made numerous trips to the Black Sea on the Graceful and Olympia.

The Treasury action did not name the 140-meter Scheherazade, a ship associated with Imperial Yachts that US intelligence officials say may have been built for Putin’s use.

“Russian elites, including President Putin, rely on complex support networks to hide, move and hold their wealth and luxury goods,” said Brian Nelson, assistant secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence at the department. of the Treasury.

“We will continue to apply our sanctions and expose the corrupt systems through which President Putin and his elites enrich themselves,” he said.

The department also announced sanctions against four Russian government officials and Yury Slyusar, president of a Russian state-owned company that supplies planes to the Russian army.

The State Department separately imposed sanctions on Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the Russian foreign minister, and Alexei Mordashov, a Russian billionaire.

The Commerce Department announced it would add 71 organizations to its list of entities, in an effort to prevent the Russian military from importing key technology.

Sergei Roldugin, a Russian cellist and a longtime friend of Putin, described by the Treasury Department as “a keeper of President Putin’s offshore wealth.”

Roldugin was added to the EU sanctions list at the end of February, just days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

It has been described as “Putin’s wallet“.

Kochman and Imperial Yachts were the focus of a New York Times investigation that showed the company was at the heart of what is essentially an oligarchic industrial complex, a network of companies that includes German shipbuilders, French designers, carpenters. high-level Italian and Spanish marinas. who serve the Russian oligarchs and employ thousands of skilled workers.

According to a US intelligence assessment, a group of investors led by one of Russia’s richest men, Gennady Timchenko, who has been subject to sanctions since 2014, has provided Imperial Yachts with the money to buy three ships:

Scheherazade, Crescent and Amadea, whose construction in a German shipyard was overseen by Imperial Yachts.

Your combined cost up to US1.6 billion dollars it could have bought six new frigates for the Russian navy.

In addition to Imperial Yachts, the Treasury Department has issued sanctions against four other companies owned or controlled by Kochman.

They include OOO Bilding Management, known as BLD Management, a company that builds and renovates villas in Russia and Western Europe for oligarchs.

An Imperial Yachts attorney, Simon Clark, previously denied that the company had any ties to Timchenko.

In a statement released Thursday after the Treasury Department’s announcement, Imperial Yachts said “the allegations made against us by the US government and the press are false.”

“Imperial Yachts conducts all its activities in full compliance with the laws and regulations in all jurisdictions in which we operate,” the company added.

“We are not involved in the financial affairs of our clients.”

But Treasury officials disputed that claim in their announcement.

US and international authorities have moved to seize the three yachts connected to Kochman and his company.

US officials are waging a judicial battle in Fiji to take control of Amadea, which they say was sold last year to Suleiman Kerimov, a Russian oligarch who is on the US sanctions list.

Feizal Haniff, a lawyer for the British Virgin Islands company that controls Amadea, said the owner is Eduard Khudainatov, who is not subject to sanctions.

Khudainatov is a protege of Igor Sechin, CEO of the state oil company Rosneft and a close ally of Putin.

Khudainatov is also the owner of Scheherazade’s card, according to documents filed by the United States in a Fijian court.

The United States claims to be a “fictitious owner“Of the two ships.

Italy seized the Scheherazade last month after it appeared to be preparing to sail from the port of Marina di Carrara on the northern coast of Tuscany.

In March, Spain seized the Crescent in the port of Tarragona.

Spanish police told Reuters the superyacht is believed to belong to Sechin.

The United States has added the Flying Fox, another yacht operated by Imperial Yachts, to the sanctions list.

The 1,136-meter ship is the largest yacht in the world available for charter, at € 3 million ($ 3.2 million) per week, according to the Imperial website.

Last year, Jay-Z and Beyoncé went on a yacht vacation.

Secretary of the Treasury, Janet Yellenand other US officials are helping lead an international effort to seize Russian assets that facilitated the Kremlin and its invasion of Ukraine.

In an interview Tuesday, ahead of the announcement of the new sanctions, Elizabeth Rosenberg, assistant secretary for terrorist financing and financial crimes at the Treasury Department, said international cooperation to prosecute Russian oligarchs and their assets is on the rise. .

“It looks like we’re going through a sea change right now,” Rosenberg said.

“It is an important step forward in international cooperation to seek assets, freeze them and carry out investigations and law enforcement activities, including seizure activities.”

Treasury officials said cracking down on oligarchs and companies that help them spend their wealth will eventually it will hurt the Russian government’s ability to declare war on Ukraine.

“Suddenly, some of these secret jurisdictions around the worldor they are no longer so secret for Russian individuals with extremely high net worth to hide and move their money, ”Rosenberg said.

“It will limit Russia’s ability to earn money to support its war effort.”

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