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Italy won't say who's paying for the care of a $700 million superyacht tied to Putin

Dustin Jones

The Scheherazade, a 460-foot superyacht, has been held in Italy since May 2022 in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It is believed to have ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Laura Lezza/Getty Images hide caption

The Scheherazade, a 460-foot superyacht, has been held in Italy since May 2022 in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It is believed to have ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Scheherazade superyacht was impounded by the Italian government in May 2022 in response to Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Instead of falling into disrepair, Italy has allowed its owner to maintain and refit the vessel, but it won't disclose who is footing the bill.

The Financial Times reported on Sunday that the vessel has been held at port in Marina di Carrara, located almost 90 miles northwest of Florence, since it was impounded by authorities in the spring of 2022. For over a year, the Italian government has permitted the owner to continue paying for the ship's staff, its maintenance and refitting of the vessel. But Italy won't identify the owner.

Italy's Finance Ministry said in a May 2022 news release that the superyacht had "significant economic and business links" with "prominent elements of the Russian government" but didn't name the owner of the ship.

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According to the website SuperYachtFan , the 460-foot superyacht belongs to Russian billionaire Eduard Khudainatov. However, Bloomberg News reported in 2022 that he is a "straw owner" of the superyacht — as well as another ship — and that the Scheherazade actually belongs to Putin.

The Financial Times reported that the Scheherazade has 22 cabins, two helicopter decks and a spa and that it's being refitted by the Italian Sea Group. NPR reached out to the Italian Sea Group for comment but did not hear back before publication.

The United States created Task Force KleptoCapture in the wake of Putin's war against Ukraine, aiming to hold Russian oligarchs accountable for evading sanctions. In its one year of operation, the task force has brought charges to at least 35 individuals and entities, NPR previously reported.

Part of those efforts included seizing luxury items belonging to billionaires with ties to the Kremlin. This includes items like a 348-foot yacht seized in Fiji in May 2022, which is valued at about $300 million and is now sitting in San Diego.

How can a $700 million superyacht sitting in an Italian port ‘belong to no one’? Russian sleuths say it’s Putin’s

In the legend of Tales From the Thousand and One Nights , Scheherazade is a beautiful virgin who escapes being murdered by the king by telling him stories at night.

Scheherazade is also President Vladimir Putin’s $700 million superyacht, according to Russian investigative journalists—and its ability to survive being seized by Western governments will require far more cunning than storytelling.

The yacht, currently moored in the Marina di Carrara on Italy’s Tuscany coast, is gargantuan, even by the outsize dimensions of Russian oligarchs’ superyachts. At about 459 feet long , it has six levels of decks, two helipads with a hidden helicopter hangar, a spa, huge living room and dining room, a swimming pool and three saunas, as well as an upper-level “owner’s area” that includes its own private spa.

“Belongs to no one”

For weeks, there have been questions about who owns the superyacht, which is registered in the Cayman Islands through a shell company. But on Monday, the group headed by jailed Russian activist Alexis Navalny claimed in a YouTube video that the vessel belongs to Putin himself.

“On paper, it belongs to no one, and sits quietly in an Italian port,” the video says in Russian. “Watch the video, and you will find out how Putin owns this yacht through figureheads, and how we can take this yacht away from him.”

The group obtained the all-Russian crew list for the yacht, and found that almost all of them were employed by Putin’s security detail, the Federal Protective Service, known by its Russian acronym FSO.

Earlier this month, the Scheherazade’ s British captain, Guy Bennett-Pearce, told the New York Times he was under “a watertight nondisclosure agreement” about who the superyacht’s true owners were, but claimed he had never seen Putin on board.

But Navalny’s group says the crew’s employment status suggests that the Russian leader owns the vessel. If that hunch is correct, it would be subject to immediate seizure under U.S., U.K., and European Union sanctions.

Superyachts have been one of the most visible signs of Russian oligarchs’ mammoth wealth—and, recently, one of the most often seized. French police seized a $120 million vessel allegedly owned by Igor Sechin, head of the Russian oil giant Rosneft, on the Mediterranean coast earlier this month . Spanish officials impounded  two more yachts, including the Crescent , a 443-foot superyacht also thought to belong to Sechin.

Another boat, owned by former KGB agent Vladimir Strzhalkovsky, was stranded in Norway when no one would sell it fuel. And on Monday, the 460-foot superyacht Solaris , owned by the sanctioned billionaire oligarch Roman Abramovich, was spotted parked in the harbor of Bodrum, Turkey; that country has not implemented sanctions.

Putin’s $200 billion

Western governments face a daunting task in tracking down Putin’s true wealth, which could amount to some $200 billion, according to financier Bill Browder, who told the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in 2017 that Putin’s inner circle of oligarchs split their billions 50-50 with the Russian president. The assets include a $1.3 billion mansion on the Black Sea, funded through a Russian health project in which Putin allies were vastly overpaid for medical supplies.

The Scheherazade , in fact, might not be Putin’s only superyacht. Last month, the vessel Graceful made a hurried departure from its berth in Hamburg as the EU was drafting tough new sanctions just days before Putin sent Russian tanks into Ukraine. Believed to be linked to Putin, that superyacht is thought to be worth $100 million .  

But untangling ownership details, and pinpointing them to Putin, will be immensely complicated.

In that, Navalny’s team has joined forces with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, or OCCRP, a Sarajevo-based group of investigative journalists, to create a database of oligarch wealth. It publishes its “ Russian Asset Tracker” in Russian , English, and Spanish.

The journalists say they are focusing on “a new generation of wealthy men obedient to Putin”—many of whom are now under Western sanctions and whose funds Western governments believe are crucial to funding the Ukraine war. The database lists mansions, superyachts, private planes, and other property, so far totaling about $17.5 billion. The group is sure that will grow, and invites people to send details of “anything we’ve missed.”

“Figuring out who owns what, and how much of it, is a tall order even for experienced police investigators,” the journalists say. “We decided to follow the trail.”

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Drone Footage Shows Superyacht Under Investigation for Putin Links

US intelligence officials told the New York Times that they were investigating a superyacht docked in Italy for possible links to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The yacht, named Scheherazade, is docked at Marina di Carrara on the west coast of Italy.

This drone footage of the yacht was taken by Carlo Demicheli on April 22, 2021.

The Italian Sea Group, which runs the port, said in a statement that the yacht was not associated with Putin.

“The Italian Sea Group, on the basis of the documentation in its possession and following the findings of the checks carried out by the relevant authorities, declares that the 140 meter yacht Scheherazade, currently in the shipyard for maintenance work, is not attributable to the property of Russian President Vladimir Putin,” the group said. Credit: Carlo Demicheli via Storyful

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Italy investigating mystery owner of $700m superyacht rumored to be putin’s.

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Italian police are investigating a mysterious $700 million superyacht moored there — amid ongoing rumors that it is owned by warmongering Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Scheherazade’s captain confirmed to the New York Times that Italian investigators boarded the 459-foot vessel in Marina di Carrara on Friday, demanding proof of ownership for what locals have long dubbed “Putin’s yacht.”

“They are looking hard. They are looking at every aspect,” Captain Guy Bennett-Pearce told the paper amid ongoing moves to seize Russian oligarchs’ yachts .

“This isn’t the local coppers coming down, these are men in dark suits,” said the British national, using a UK term for police officers.

Bennett-Pearce refused to reveal the identity of the owner of the yacht, whose crew was at least 70 percent Russian, he said.

But he said he had “no choice” but to this week hand over documents revealing the owner’s identity to the investigating squad, which a source told the Times was led by Italian financial police.

One of the most expensive yachts in the world, Scheherazade has a swimming pool that converts to a dance floor, gold-plated fixtures, two helicopter decks and numerous satellite domes, the report said.

“Scheherazade” is the title of a symphonic work by the Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and each of the last two summers the yacht has sailed to Sochi, the Times said of the Russian city where Putin is rumored to own a personal “palace.”

“Everybody calls it Putin’s yacht,” one local, retired clerk Ernesto Rossi, told the Times. “It’s a rumor that’s been going around for months.”

One former crew member told the Times that shipmates also called it “Putin’s yacht,” saying that when in use by the owner, it was manned by an all-Russian staff.

Bennett-Pearce admitted that he had also heard the rumor and local nickname, but said that a “watertight nondisclosure agreement” prevented him from identifying the owner.

However, he denied it was Putin, telling the paper, “I have never seen him. I have never met him.”

Confirming his plan to finally tell the Italian investigators the owner’s identity, he told the paper, “I have no doubt in my mind whatsoever that this will clear the vessel of all negative rumors and speculations.”

Get the latest updates in the Russia-Ukraine conflict with The Post’s live coverage.

The Scheherazade’s builder, Lurssen Group, declined to comment to the paper about its ownership.

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Russian opposition group report says it's identified another superyacht belonging to Vladimir Putin

• A Russian military plant built Vladimir Putin a 71-meter superyacht, according to a new report.
• The report was written by the Dossier Center, a Russian opposition group funded by an exiled oligarch.
• Putin's rumored mistress often uses the yacht on vacation, according to the report.

Vladimir Putin's newest known superyacht is 71 meters long, cost an estimated $50 million to build, and can carry up to 28 people, according to a new report from Russian opposition group the Dossier Center.

The vessel, called the Victoria, is based in Sochi but in October docked at a Turkish port near Istanbul for repairs, according to ship tracking data cited in the report. Construction on the yacht began in 2005 at a Russian military facility that typically produces nuclear submarines, according to the report, citing unnamed sources close to Putin.

The Dossier Center, an investigative outlet funded by exiled petroleum oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky – by some estimates, once the richest man in Russia – last month revealed that Russia had accidentally doxed its own spies by uploading their addresses onto a public city hall website.

We found the secret yacht of Vladimir Putin docked at a naval shipyard of a NATO (!) country. How is this possible and what does it tell us about the character of his regime? 🧵 Read on to find out (and see pictures) - 1/18 pic.twitter.com/RhIzjmFbz3 — Mikhail Khodorkovsky (@khodorkovsky_en) November 22, 2023

Officially, Putin takes a salary of about $140,000 a year and lives in a small Moscow apartment – but extensive reporting shows the dictator almost certainly controls numerous estates and a small flotilla of luxury yachts . While there's no official estimate of his net worth, observers have pegged it in the tens of billions of dollars.

After Russia invaded Ukraine last year, authorities seized a $700 million superyacht linked to Putin with six floors, two helipads, a swimming pool , a beauty salon, and gold-plated bathrooms.

Victoria is nowhere near as grand. It has just two master cabins, according to the Dossier Center's report. But it also has the distinction of being linked to former Russian gymnast Alina Kabaeva, rumored to be Putin's mistress and the father of his children.

Given how it looks like from inside – who wouldn't be tempted? 15/18 pic.twitter.com/pCCQ6YLqKd — Mikhail Khodorkovsky (@khodorkovsky_en) November 22, 2023

Kabaeva's friend, another Russian gymnast and the choreography director of a gymnastics festival Kabaeva organizes, posted a photo of herself on social media with the yacht in the background. And an anonymous source told The Dossier Center that Kabaeva often vacations on the Victoria.

Spokespeople for the Russian president and the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Watch: Inside Putin's secret bunker and billion-dollar palace

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Russian oligarch's yacht is costing U.S. taxpayers close to $1 million a month

A mega-yacht seized by U.S. authorities from a Russian oligarch is costing the government nearly $1 million a month to maintain, according to new court filings.

The U.S. Department of Justice is seeking permission to sell a 348-foot yacht called Amadea, which it seized in 2022, alleging that it was owned by sanctioned Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov. The government said it wants to sell the $230 million yacht due to the “excessive costs” of maintenance and crew, which it said could total $922,000 a month.

“It is excessive for taxpayers to pay nearly a million dollars per month to maintain the Amadea when these expenses could be reduced to zero through [a] sale,” according to a court filing by U.S. prosecutors on Friday.

The monthly charges for Amadea, which is now docked in San Diego, California, include $600,000 per month in running costs: $360,000 for the crew; $75,000 for fuel; and $165,000 for maintenance, waste removal, food and other expenses. They also include $144,000 in monthly pro-rata insurance costs and special charges including dry-docking fees, at $178,000, bringing the total to $922,000, according to the filings.

The battle over Amadea and the costs to the government highlight the financial and legal challenges of seizing and selling assets owned by Russian oligarchs after the country’s invasion of Ukraine. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said last week that the European Union should use profits from more than $200 billion of frozen Russian assets to fund Ukraine’s war effort.

Her comments echoed government calls in the spring of 2022 to freeze the yachts, private jets and mansions of Russian billionaires in hopes of putting pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin and raising money for the war effort.

Yet, nearly two years later, the legal process for proving ownership of the Russian assets and selling them has proven to be far more time-consuming and costly. In London, Russian billionaire Eugene Shvidler has waged a court battle over his private jets that were impounded, and Sergei Naumenko has been appealing the detention of his superyacht Phi.

The battle over Amadea began in April 2022, when it was seized in Fiji at the request of the U.S. government, according to the court filings.

Though the U.S. alleges that the yacht is owned by Kerimov, who made his fortune in mining, attorneys for Eduard Khudainatov, an ex-Rosneft CEO who has not been sanctioned, say he owns the yacht, and have sought to take back possession of the vessel.

In court filings, Khudainatov’s attorneys have objected to the U.S. government’s efforts to sell the yacht, saying a rushed sale could lead to a distressed sale price and that the maintenance costs are minor relative to the potential sale value.

Khudainatov’s attorneys refuse to pay the ongoing maintenance costs as long as the government pursues a sale and forfeiture. However, they say their client will reimburse the U.S. government for the more than $20 million already spent to maintain the yacht if it’s returned to its proper owner.

In court papers, the government says Kerimov disguised his ownership of Amadea through a series of shell companies and other owners. They say emails between crew members show Kerimov “was the beneficial owner of the yacht, irrespective of the titleholder of the vessel.”

The emails show that Kerimov and his family ordered several interior improvements of the yacht, including a new pizza oven and spa, and that between 2021 and 2022, when the boat was seized, “there were no guest trips on the Amadea that did not include either Kerimov or his family members,” according to the court filings.

The government also says Kerimov has been trying to sell Amadea for years, so a sale would be in keeping with his intent.

“This is not a situation in which a court would be ordering sale of a precious heirloom that a claimant desperately wishes to keep for sentimental reasons,” the government said in filings.

Even if Amadea were sold quickly, the proceeds wouldn’t automatically go to the government. Under law, the money would be held while Khudainatov and the government continue their battle in court over the ownership and forfeiture.

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Putin was watching a festival from aboard a yacht during Prigozhin's mutiny

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According to Russian journalists, on the day of the mutiny of the Wagner Private Military Company (PMC), Russian President Vladimir Putin was watching the Alye Parusa festival in St Petersburg from aboard a yacht of businessman Yuriy Kovalchuk.

Source : Novaya Gazeta Europe with reference to the information of journalists Mikhail Zygar and Yulia Taratuta

Details : Mikhail Zygar, a political journalist and former editor-in-chief of the Dozhd TV channel, wrote in a column for The New York Times that Putin never misses a graduation party in his hometown, and this year was no exception, despite the situation with Yevgeny Prigozhin .

According to Zygar, on 24 June, Putin watched the Alye Parusa festival from aboard a yacht of his friend, businessman Yuriy Kovalchuk.

The journalist's sources call this the clearest evidence that the president of the Russian Federation is detached from reality.

"He still believes that he has everything under control and that Prigozhin's rebellion had no effect on the political situation. But he is wrong. [...] Many people I spoke to believe that Putin's system of government simply cannot last long", Zygar shared.

In a column for Dozhd, Taratuta reported, citing sources familiar with the situation, that a new yacht was presented to Putin on the holiday – instead of the Shaherezada, confiscated in Italy due to sanctions. According to sources, Kovalchuk personally prepared the gift.

"The yacht took three years to build, or even five – here, the versions differ. Only one thing is known for sure: it was gifted. Neither the war with Ukraine, nor Prigozhin's mutiny, nor the bombing of Rostov and Voronezh got in the way," says Taratuta.

Background : On 24 June, the day of the mutiny of Wagner Group fighters, Russian media outlet Vazhnye Istorii (Important Stories) citing FlightRadar data reported that Putin's special Il96-300PU (Control Point) aircraft departed Moscow for St Petersburg at 14:16 (Moscow time), but it disappeared from the tracking system over the Tver area.

At the same time, Ukrainian intelligence stated that Russian dictator Vladimir Putin left Moscow for his residence in Valdai. Meanwhile, Putin’s press secretary denied this and claimed that Russia’s president is "working in the Kremlin".

Background :

On the evening of 23 June, Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin claimed that the regular Russian army had launched a missile strike on the Wagner mercenaries’ rear camps. He has therefore deployed 25,000 of his mercenaries "to restore justice".

Prigozhin claimed that his forces had taken control of military facilities in Rostov-on-Don , including the air base, and were heading "to Moscow" and that his soldiers had shot down at least three Russian helicopters. Wagner mercenaries have also seized military facilities in the Russian city of Voronezh .

In an emergency address on 24 June, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia is " fighting for survival " and that attempts are being made to "organise a rebellion" in the country.

On the afternoon of 24 June, Russian media reported that the Office of the President of the Russian Federation anticipates that Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group fighters will likely reach Moscow’s outskirts in the next few hours, with fighting expected near Russia’s capital . Ukrainian intelligence has information that Putin has urgently left Moscow for his residence in Valdai. A Wagner Group convoy has been spotted 400 km from Moscow.

On Saturday evening, after a conversation with self-proclaimed Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, Prigozhin announced that his mercenaries were turning their convoys around and going back to set up field camps. Later, it was reported that the criminal case against Prigozhin is to be closed and he will "go to Belarus".

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Trump Confuses Biden With Obama, Again—Here Are 8 Other Recent Times

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Former President Donald Trump appeared to confuse former President Barack Obama with President Joe Biden during a rally Saturday night, the latest in a series of gaffes from Trump as the age and mental well-being of both top presidential candidates remains a concern for voters.

During a campaign rally Saturday night, Trump appeared to mix-up Obama with Biden, again.

The gaffe came when Trump was discussing Vladimir Putin and said the Russian president “has so little respect for Obama that he’s starting to throw around the nuclear word.”

Video of the event shows the crowd going silent after Trump’s reference to Obama, before Trump then names Biden, and calls him “a fool.”

In at least seven other instances, Trump has seemed to confuse Obama with Biden.

Last week, when referencing Putin at the Conservative Political Action Conference Trump made another Putin-related gaffe, saying he agreed with the Russian President that he’d rather see Biden as president.

Over the course of just several months last fall, Trump seemed to confuse Biden with Obama seven different times . In a November speech, recounting a speech by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, during an Oct. 1 rally in Iowa, twice on Oct. 11 during a Fox News Radio interview, and then three more times on Sept. 15, during a speech to faith leaders in Washington. Trump’s near-obsession with Obama tracks back many years, long before he ran for president, when he was spreading false information about Obama’s birth country.

Key Background

Saturday’s mistake is not the first from the 77-year-old former president. Last week, he appeared to refer to his wife Melania Trump as “Mercedes” during his CPAC remarks. The week before that he told Michigan voters to vote on the “very important date” of November 27, though the state’s primary election was on February 27. Trump has tried to defend himself by saying he “sarcastically” interchanges Obama and Biden “as an indication that others may actually be having a very big influence in running our Country.” Biden, 81, has had a run of bad public-speaking mishaps amid increased scrutiny. The Justice Department’s report, released last month by Special Counsel Robert Hur, found Biden “willfully” retained classified materials while a private citizen, but chose not to bring criminal charges, saying as Biden can appear as an “elderly man with a poor memory.” Then, in defending himself the day of the report, Biden made yet another mistake, erroneously calling Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi the “president of Mexico.”

42%. That's the percentage of people who say they at least somewhat agree Trump is too old to be an effective president, according to a new New York Times/Siena College poll out Sunday. Some 73% said the same about Biden.

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Ukraine claims it has sunk another Russian warship in the Black Sea using high-tech sea drones

A Ukrainian officer from The 56th Separate Motorized Infantry Mariupol Brigade fires a multiple launch rocket system based on a pickup truck towards Russian positions at the front line, near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

FILE - In this undated photo provided by Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine a Magura V5 (maritime autonomous guard unmanned robotic apparatus V-type), Ukrainian multi-purpose unmanned surface boat, is seen in Ukraine. Ukraine claimed Tuesday it has sunk another Russian warship in the Black Sea using high-tech sea drones as Kyiv’s forces continue to take aim at targets deep behind the war’s front line. Russian authorities did not confirm the claim. The Ukrainian military intelligence agency said a special operations unit destroyed the large patrol ship Sergey Kotov overnight with Magura V5 uncrewed vessels that are designed and built in Ukraine and laden with explosives (Daniyar Sarsenov/Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine via AP, File)

In this photo taken from video released by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Monday, March 4, 2024, a Russian serviceman votes at an improvised pooling station during early voting in the Russian presidential elections in the Russian-controlled Donetsk region, eastern Ukraine. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)

A Ukrainian soldier from The 56th Separate Motorized Infantry Mariupol Brigade prepare to fires a multiple launch rocket system based on a pickup truck towards Russian positions at the front line, near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

Ukrainian soldiers from The 56th Separate Motorized Infantry Mariupol Brigade prepare to fire a multiple launch rocket system based on a pickup truck towards Russian positions at the front line, near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

A multiple launch rocket system based on a pickup truck fires towards Russian positions at the front line, near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Tuesday, March 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

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KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine claimed Tuesday it has sunk another Russian warship in the Black Sea using high-tech sea drones as Kyiv’s forces take aim at targets well behind the war’s front line. Russian authorities did not confirm the claim.

The Ukrainian military intelligence agency said a special operations unit destroyed the large patrol ship Sergey Kotov overnight. The ship, which Ukraine said was commissioned in 2021 and was hit near the Kerch Strait , reportedly can carry cruise missiles and around 60 crew.

The sinking of such a modern ship would be a significant loss and embarrassing blow for Moscow, even though there are dozens of other vessels in its Black Sea fleet.

Kyiv officials say some 20% of Russian missile attacks on Ukraine are launched from the Black Sea, and successful Ukrainian attacks have dented Moscow’s capability.

Patrol ships such as the Sergey Kotov are part of Russia’s countermeasures against drone attacks, according to an article published last month by the Foreign Policy Research Institute, a U.S. think tank. The vessels use radar and a helicopter to detect and destroy drones using grenade launchers and heavy machine guns, it said.

Kyiv’s forces are struggling to keep the better-provisioned Russian army at bay at some points along the largely static 1,500-kilometer (930-mile) front line, but are also taking aim at targets far beyond it.

In the Black Sea , Ukrainian successes against enemy warships have pushed the Russian fleet away from the coast, allowing Ukraine to set up a grain export corridor .

The Ukraine defense ministry posted on X, formerly Twitter, a video of what it said was the nighttime attack on the Sergey Kotov using Magura V5 uncrewed vessels that are designed and built in Ukraine and laden with explosives. Seven Russian crew members were killed and six were injured, while 52 were rescued, the military intelligence agency said.

The Ukrainian claims could not immediately be independently verified. Disinformation has been a feature of the fighting that broke out after Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.

The private security firm Ambrey said the attack took place at the port of Feodosia, in Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014. Ambrey said it has seen footage taken by a crew member on a merchant vessel in the port, showing the Sergey Kotov firing at the drones.

The ship was hit at least twice, with the second strike resulting in a large blast, Ambrey reported.

Last month, Ukraine claimed it twice sank Russian warships using drones. On Feb. 1, it claimed to have sunk the Russian missile-armed corvette Ivanovets, and on Feb. 14 it said it destroyed the Caesar Kunikov landing ship. Russian officials did not confirm those claims.

Almost two years ago, the flagship of Russia’s Black Sea fleet, the Moskva guided-missile cruiser , sank after it was heavily damaged in a missile attack.

Also Tuesday, the Russian military scrambled a Su-27 fighter jet to escort a French E-3F military surveillance plane, accompanied by two Rafale fighter jets, in international air space over the Black Sea.

The Russian Defense Ministry said the Su-27 was scrambled to “prevent a violation of the state border of the Russian Federation,” adding that the French planes turned away from the Russian border after the Russian jet approached.

Moscow has repeatedly accused NATO allies of gathering intelligence information to assist Ukrainian strikes on Russian forces.

In November, the Russian military threatened to shoot down a French surveillance aircraft patrolling in international airspace. French officials said the Russian military issued the warning in a radio exchange with one of the French early warning and control aircraft as it flew over international waters in the Black Sea.

Associated Press writer Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

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A 459-Foot Mystery in a Tuscan Port: Is It a Russian’s Superyacht?

As European authorities go after the luxury assets of oligarchs close to Vladimir Putin, a superyacht cloaked in secrecy has come under investigation.

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By Michael Forsythe ,  Gaia Pianigiani and David D. Kirkpatrick

From Germany’s North Sea ports to the French Riviera, open season has been declared on superyachts. Across Europe, authorities are hunting down luxury vessels tied to Russian oligarchs in the effort to inflict pain on President Vladimir V. Putin’s allies.

In Marina di Carrara, a small Italian town on the Tuscan coast, one of the world’s biggest, newest and most expensive superyachts — called the Scheherazade — is under scrutiny by the Italian police. Almost as long as a U.S. guided-missile destroyer, it dominates the waterfront.

The yacht, estimated by the website SuperYachtFan to cost about $700 million, has two helicopter decks and is studded with satellite domes. Inside, photos supplied by a former crew member show, is a swimming pool with a retractable cover that converts to a dance floor. Then there’s the fully equipped gym and the gold-plated fixtures in the bathrooms.

In the rarefied world of the biggest superyachts ( only 14 that are at least 140 meters, or 459 feet long), the Scheherazade is alone in that no likely owner has been publicly identified. That has spurred speculation that it could be a Middle Eastern billionaire or a superconnected Russian — even Mr. Putin.

The ship’s captain, Guy Bennett-Pearce, a British national, denied that Mr. Putin owned or had ever been on the yacht. “I have never seen him. I have never met him,” he said. He added, in a phone interview from the yacht, that its owner was not on any sanctions list. He did not rule out that the person could be Russian, but declined to say more about the owner’s identity, citing a “watertight nondisclosure agreement.”

Captain Bennett-Pearce said that Italian investigators had come aboard on Friday and examined some of the ship’s certification documents. “They are looking hard. They are looking at every aspect,” he said. “This isn’t the local coppers coming down, these are men in dark suits.” A person familiar with the matter, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss it, confirmed that the Italian financial police had opened an inquiry.

On Monday night, Captain Bennett-Pearce said he had “no choice” but to hand over documents revealing the owner’s identity to the Italian authorities. He said he would do so on Tuesday and had been told they would be handled with “confidentiality.”

“I have no doubt in my mind whatsoever that this will clear the vessel of all negative rumors and speculations,” he wrote in a message to a New York Times reporter.

The mystery about the ship’s owner arose because — even for the hyper-confidential world of superyachting — there is an unusual degree of secrecy surrounding this vessel. Not only do contractors and crew members sign nondisclosure agreements, as on many superyachts, but the ship also has a cover to hide its name plate. And when it first arrived at the port, workers erected a tall metallic barrier on the pier to partly obscure the yacht from onlookers. Some locals remarked that they had never seen anything like it for other boats.

In his State of the Union address last week, President Biden announced a Justice Department task force to go after oligarchs close to Mr. Putin and facing sanctions in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Sanctions have been imposed against hundreds of people, and the list keeps growing.

Last week, French authorities seized the yacht Amore Vero near Marseille as it was preparing to depart, claiming it was owned by a man on that list: Igor Sechin, the head of the Russian state-owned oil company Rosneft. In Italy, police in Sanremo impounded Lena, a yacht belonging to Gennady Timchenko, a Putin friend who controls an oil exporting company. In nearby Imperia, police also impounded the Lady M, a yacht belonging to Alexei Mordashov, Russia’s richest man. The fate of the Dilbar, one of the world’s biggest yachts that the United States says belongs to the oligarch Alisher Usmanov, is unclear. It is in Hamburg, and German officials said the vessel could not leave without an export waiver, Bloomberg News reported .

Some of the biggest superyachts are owned by Russians who are not on the sanctions list. The world’s second-largest, Eclipse, which has a missile defense system and a mini submarine, is owned by Roman Abramovich, the billionaire who is selling his ownership stake in the British soccer club Chelsea. Andrey Melnichenko, a billionaire coal baron, owns Sailing Yacht A.

Determining the ownership of assets that the wealthy want to keep hidden is difficult, especially without a warrant, because they are often zealously guarded by private bankers and lawyers and tucked away in opaque shell companies in offshore secrecy havens. The Scheherazade is flagged in the Cayman Islands and its owner, Bielor Assets Ltd. , is registered in the Marshall Islands. The yacht’s management company, which Captain Bennett-Pearce says is also registered in the Cayman Islands, works from the ship and uses his rental villa in nearby Lucca as its address.

One trade website, which bills itself as “the global authority in superyachting,” claims that the vessel’s owner is “known to be a Middle Eastern billionaire.” The Scheherazade shares a name with the female storyteller in “The Arabian Nights,” and it made one brief foray into the Red Sea in September 2020, calling at the Egyptian port of Hurghada. But mostly it stays in Marina di Carrara, where it has been moored since last September.

Locals have their own theory about the ship’s ownership. Some have heard people onboard speaking Russian. And Scheherazade is also the title of a symphonic work by the Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

“Everybody calls it Putin’s yacht, but nobody knows whose it is,” said Ernesto Rossi, a retired clerk who was taking a walk along the marina’s promenade on Friday. “It’s a rumor that’s been going around for months.”

In Italy, the phrase “Putin’s yacht” has become shorthand for a mysterious and ultra-luxurious ship. It’s also a joke among the dozens of crew members, Captain Bennett-Pearce said. “I’ve heard the same rumors.”

Another, smaller vessel, the Graceful, has long been tied to the Russian president and is known as “Putin’s yacht.” It was tracked leaving Germany for the Russian port of Kaliningrad just weeks before the invasion of Ukraine. (U.S. government officials point out that Mr. Putin owns little outright; many of the luxurious homes or ships he uses are owned by oligarchs.)

Mr. Putin appears to have a penchant for big pleasure boats. During his time as Russia’s leader, he’s been photographed on yachts from Russia’s northern reaches to the Black Sea in the south. Last May, he and Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, took a cruise on a yacht at the Black Sea resort city of Sochi.

The Scheherazade’s builder, Lurssen Group, whose website promises customers “complete confidentiality,” declined to comment about its ownership. Until June 2020, when the completed ship left the pier in Bremen, Germany, it had the code name “Lightning.” The same company built the even bigger superyacht the Dilbar. A similar gigantic yacht, code-named “Luminance,” is now being built at Lurssen, scheduled to be completed next year.

“Of course, all orders and projects of the Lurssen Group and its subsidiaries are treated in accordance with the applicable laws and regulations,” said Oliver Grun, a company spokesman.

About 70 percent of the Scheherazade’s crew is Russian, Captain Bennett-Pearce said. And during each of the past two summers, it has sailed to Sochi, the last time in early July 2021, according to MarineTraffic, a top maritime analytics provider. The ship’s construction was managed by Imperial Yachts, a company in Monaco that, Reuters reported , manages the Amore Vero, Mr. Sechin’s seized yacht. Nick Flashman, who oversees construction of large vessels at Imperial Yachts, declined to comment.

One former crew member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the nondisclosure agreement, said that shipmates called it “Putin’s yacht.” The person said the ship was manned by an international crew during “boss off” times; when it was “boss on,” the crew was replaced by an all-Russian staff. In the weeks before the Scheherazade’s 2020 trip to the Black Sea, the foreign crew was dismissed, the person said.

The former crew member supplied photos of rosters of both international and Russian crew members. The Times reached out, via social media, phone or email, to at least 17 of them. Few responded.

One of the Russians said only that he had worked on the Scheherazade, citing a nondisclosure agreement. Another person said it would be dangerous to talk. One man denied serving on the vessel; another said he hadn’t worked at sea in 25 years.

Captain Bennett-Pearce said “categorically there is not a European crew that comes on and a Russian crew that comes on.” Many of the ship’s senior officers are from Britain, New Zealand and Spain. Many international crew members were dismissed in 2020, replaced by Russians who didn’t demand the high salaries and benefits that their predecessors had, the captain said. “It came down to economics,” he said.

Given the antipathy that people outside of Russia have toward Mr. Putin, if the Russian president really were the owner or principal user of the yacht, keeping non-Russian senior crew members like him on staff would make no sense, Captain Bennett-Pearce said.

“If there’s a European crew onboard it’s the biggest smoke and mirror and the biggest risk I’ve ever heard of,” he said.

Reporting was contributed by Dmitriy Khavin , Christoph Koettl , Julian E. Barnes , Jason Horowitz , Rebecca R. Ruiz and Eric Schmitt .

Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article referred imprecisely to the new task force announced by President Biden in his State of the Union address. He announced a Justice Department task force to pursue and seize the assets of oligarchs associated with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, not a joint task force with partners in Europe, which was previously announced.

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Michael Forsythe is a reporter on the investigations team. He was previously a correspondent in Hong Kong, covering the intersection of money and politics in China. He has also worked at Bloomberg News and is a United States Navy veteran. More about Michael Forsythe

Gaia Pianigiani is a reporter based in Italy for The New York Times.  More about Gaia Pianigiani

David D. Kirkpatrick is an investigative reporter based in New York and the author of “Into the Hands of the Soldiers: Freedom and Chaos in Egypt and the Middle East.“ In 2020 he shared a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on covert Russian interference in other governments and as the Cairo bureau chief from 2011 to 2015 he led coverage of the Arab Spring uprisings. More about David D. Kirkpatrick

Our Coverage of the War in Ukraine

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The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for two top Russian military officers , accusing them of war crimes in Ukraine for targeting civilians and destroying crucial energy infrastructure.

The capture of the eastern Ukrainian city of Avdiivka  was the Russians’ most significant gain in nine months . Among the reasons for their success were dwindling Ukrainian ammunition , declining Western aid and poor Ukrainian defenses .

The Ukraine war has been fought largely on the ground in the past two years. But as the Russian military presses on with attacks in the east, its air force has taken on a greater role .

Holding a Sliver of Hope: A Russian mother knows her son, a conscript, died 14 months ago in a battle in eastern Ukraine. But she is still waiting for him.

A Long Fight: On the second anniversary  of Russia’s invasion, many weary but determined Ukrainians  are taking a longer view of the war , pinpointing the Maidan uprising of 2014 as the start of a 10-year conflict with their adversary.

Sending a Message: Two years since the start of the war in Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin of Russia has fully embraced the image of an unpredictable strongman  ready to escalate his conflict with the West.

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Our team of visual journalists analyzes satellite images, photographs , videos and radio transmissions  to independently confirm troop movements and other details.

We monitor and authenticate reports on social media, corroborating these with eyewitness accounts and interviews. Read more about our reporting efforts .

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Ukraine says it sank a Russian warship off Crimea in much-needed victory amid front line losses

By Anhelina Shamlii

Updated on: March 5, 2024 / 12:42 PM EST / CBS News

Ukraine's military intelligence service said Tuesday that a special operations unit from the war-torn country had managed to sink another Russian warship. The intel agency released a statement early Tuesday morning saying the Russian patrol ship Sergey Kotov was destroyed near the Kerch Strait, off the coast of Russian-occupied Crimea.

It said the ship was sunk in an overnight operation carried out by the "Group 13" special forces unit using Ukrainian-made Magura V5 maritime drones. It estimated the loss to Russia's navy of being in the region of $65 million.

A video posted on social media by Ukraine's military intelligence agency showed what it said was the drone attack on the Russian vessel.

The number of crew who were on board the patrol ship, and their fate, was still being determined, according to Andriy Yusov, a representative of the Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. He said there were believed to be dead and wounded Russian sailors as a result of the attack.

The patrol ship reportedly had the ability to carry cruise missiles and up to 60 crew members. 

The drone strike came shortly after reports of explosions being heard in the city of Kerch, on the Crimean Peninsula. Social media posts reported  that the strategic Crimean Bridge, which connects the peninsula that Russia seized from Ukraine in 2014 with the Russian mainland, was closed for more than eight hours.

The Russian ship previously sustained damage and underwent repairs following a previous maritime drone strike by the Ukrainian Armed Forces in September 2023.

Andriy Yermak, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's Chief of Staff,  said on Tuesday  that the "Russian Black Sea Fleet is a symbol of occupation," adding that it "cannot be in Ukrainian Crimea."

Russian officials did not immediately comment on the reported sinking.

Ukraine said it sank two other Russian warships in February,  a landing vessel called the Caesar Kunikov, also off the coast of Crimea, as well as a missile-armed corvette called the Ivanovets.

Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022, Ukrainian forces claim to have destroyed or damaged at least two dozen Russian ships.

But those individual victories at sea come as Russian troops  continue advancing , taking new ground, along the long front line that stretches from north to south across eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine's political and military leaders have beseeched their Western partners for months, begging for more desperately needed ammunition, artillery and other weapons — and warning that without new supplies, they won't be able to keep Russia at bay.

The most urgent request from Kyiv has been for the U.S. Congress to approve a $60 billion additional aid package, which has been held up by partisan gridlock since late last year.

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I’m in a Russian prison. This is how my friend Alexei Navalny showed us Putin’s hypocrisy

Putin claims to embody faith and family values only to manipulate ordinary Russians. But Alexei truly lived by them

• Ilya Yashin is a Russian opposition politician. He is a former leader of the People’s Freedom party

V ladimir Putin speaks often, and at length, about conservative values. Europe and the US want to impose their debauched and godless ways on us, he tells Russians, to frighten them and to justify a standoff against “the collective west”. On the subject of the war, he expounds that only the Russian army can save Ukrainian schoolchildren from “gender-neutral toilets”. His electoral manifesto places a heavy emphasis on the family as the basis of Russian society, and on his commitment to tradition and religious belief.

All this rhetoric is pure hypocrisy. Conservative discourse is, for Putin, no more than a political tool for manipulating the consciousness of the populace. The reality is that the Russian president leads an immoral life, wholly contrary to the values he purports to embody.

Putin claims to be a man of faith who partakes in Christian rituals. The reality is that he has started a bloody war in eastern Europe, a war in which Christians are killing other Christians.

He claims to be the defender of family life. In reality, he is a man who has publicly distanced himself from his own daughters, and when he mentions them to the press, it’s as “those women”.

Putin’s hypocrisy is obvious; next to him, Alexei Navalny appeared as a much more holistic, balanced person, one who was grounded in conservatism in the sane, normal sense of the word.

I knew Alexei for 23 years; we were friends, and I know his family well. I can attest that he truly was a man of faith, for whom the commandments “thou shalt not kill” and “thou shalt not steal”, and the ethical precepts of the Sermon on the Mount, were not the mere trappings of religion, but became a lodestar for his life and his politics. I can say with certainty that unlike Putin, Alexei was a true family man, too: a loving son, husband and father. His family life, based on love and mutual respect, was always for me a source of admiration.

The pressure that the Russian government and intelligence agencies brought to bear on Alexei’s family is well documented. His brother, Oleg, was arrested and effectively held hostage for three and a half years. Alexei’s Moscow flat and his parents’ home were routinely searched. His children were spied on, his daughter, Dasha, regularly trailed to school by plainclothes agents of the Russian federal security service, the FSB.

His wife, Yulia Navalnaya, used to tell journalists that Putin apparently saw their family as Alexei’s weak spot (possibly thinking of his own). Then she’d explain that Putin was wrong; on the contrary, his family was for Alexei his main source of support, a wellspring of strength and inspiration. Yulia herself was not just his steadfast wife, but also a key political adviser, whose opinion he always took into consideration.

His family remains Alexei’s source of strength even now that he has perished in prison. Yulia never had independent aspirations, nor intended a political career for herself. But by killing Alexei, Putin left her no choice – and she has seized the banner of struggle.

I suspect that Putin is prone to chauvinism and will hardly take a woman seriously as an opponent. But he doesn’t know Yulia very well, and soon, I’m sure, he will realise his mistake.

As for me, I wish Yulia Navalnaya every success, and will be rooting for her, if only from behind bars.

Translated from Russian by Ilona Yazhbin Chavasse

Ilya Yashin is a Russian opposition politician, and was a close ally of Alexei Navalny. He was the leader of the People’s Freedom party. In 2022 he was charged with spreading false information after reporting on the Russian military’s war crimes in Bucha, and sentenced to eight and a half years in prison

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here .

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