10 Friday March 18 2022 | the times
News
Yachts moored in Britain
investigated for oligarch link
Oliver Wright Policy EditorMinisters are investigating who owns a
number of yachts moored in Britain
amid suspicions that they are linked to
sanctioned Russians.
Grant Shapps, the transport secre-
tary, told MPs that the government had
already impounded several private jets
linked to senior figures in Russia that
had been in the UK at the time sanc-
tions were imposed.
He said officials were also trying to
establish the ownership of a “small
number of yachts moored in this coun-
try” in case they were connected to
those on the sanctions list. He added: “I
have taken steps to ensure they are un-
able to depart and investigations are
ongoing.”
Several yachts belonging to oligarchs
have already been impounded across
Europe in response to the co-ordinated
sanctions imposed by Britain, the EU
and other western allies.
Spain seized the 279ft superyacht Va-lerie belonging to Sergei Chemezov, a
former KGB officer who now heads the
state conglomerate Rostec. The £
million boat, moored in Barcelona, was
registered to Chemezov’s stepdaughter,
Anastasia Ignatova, through a British
Virgin Islands company.
French authorities seized a yacht
owned by Igor Sechin, boss of the Rus-
sian state energy company Rosneft. It
was impounded by French customs of-
ficers near Marseilles where it was
undergoing refurbishment work.
The most expensive yacht to be
seized was the £443 million Sailing
Yacht A which was confiscated by Ital-
ian police in the port of Trieste.
It is owned by billionaire Andrey
Melnichenko, 50, who made a fortune
in fertiliser production and coal. Mel-
nichenko, who has also been sanc-
tioned by the UK, brought the yacht to
London in 2016 — where it was so large
Tower Bridge had to be raised to let it
through. The oligarch is also believed to
own two properties in the UK.Boris Johnson is planning a one-to-one
meeting with President Biden at a Nato
summit next week as discussions begin
about how to prepare for the “end-
game” in Ukraine.
President Zelensky of Ukraine is
said to be increasingly hopeful that
peace talks could be successful because
Russia’s advance has stalled.
During talks with Johnson, Zelensky
is reported to have discussed how other
countries could act as “guarantors of
that peace” if a settlement is reached.
The prime minister is also understood
to be open to accepting an invitation to
attend the European Council after the
summit, though an invitation has not
been extended yet. An invitation would
represent a symbolic step after Brexit.
Russia is demanding that Ukraine
renounce any ambitions for Nato mem-
bership and recognise its annexation of
Crimea and the independence of two
statelets in the eastern Donbas region.
Biden will travel to Brussels for the
summit on Thursday. Johnson hopes to
have a meeting with him in the margins
but this has not been finalised.
A government source said:
“Thoughts are turning to the endgame.
The losses Russia is suffering are unsus-
tainable. If there is a settlement, there
needs to be a discussion about how that
settlement can be guaranteed.”
The involvement of any western
nation as a guarantor of a peace deal is
likely to prove contentious with Russia.
Ukraine is refusing to recognise the
annexation of Crimea and the
independence of the territories in the
Donbas. Still, negotiators on both sides
believe they are inching towards a deal.
Biden is also considering going to
Poland. “His goal is to meet in person,
face to face with his European counter-
parts, and talk about, assess where we
are at this point in the conflict,” the
source said.
Biden has branded President Putin a
war criminal while Johnson has said
repeatedly that “Putin must fail”. There
is acknowledgement among officials,
however, that there must be an “off-
ramp” for Putin if the conflict is to end.
Optimism about a deal rose on Tues-
day when Zelensky said Ukraine had to
accept that it would not join Nato. Rus-
sian diplomats claimed that he was
ready to agree “neutrality” for Ukraine.
Vladimir Medinsky, Russia’s chief
negotiator, said: “Ukraine is offering an
Austrian or Swedish version of a
neutral demilitarised state but at the
same time a state with its own army and
navy.” The deal would specify that
Ukraine could negotiate security alli-
ances with western countries but not
have foreign military bases on its terri-
tory, which it says is already the case.
Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign
minister, said: “Neutral status is now
being seriously discussed along, of
course, with security guarantees.”
Neutrality would be the gain Putin
could claim to justify the deaths of
thousands of Russian soldiers and the
crippling sanctions imposed. Under
any deal, sanctions would be lifted but
trade is unlikely to return to normal.
Biden’s natural caution borders on
timidity, Gerard Baker, page 29
Waning of US power, letters, page 30
PM seeks one to one
talks with Biden on
Ukraine settlement
Steven Swinford Political Editor
Quentin Letts
The long-running libel
gravy train hits buffers
W
ith heaviest of
hearts I must
report that some of
London’s priciest
libel lawyers came
in for a spectacular bogwashing.
One can scarce imagine the
moist-hankied distress this will
have caused. In different
circumstance it would have been
worth at least fifty thousand
smackers in legal letters. The
emotional damage! The intrusive
assault! The lowering of
upstanding citizens in the
estimation of others, exposing
them to contempt, derision and
general choruses of “yer teeth are
offside, Luis Suárez”!
Dominic Raab, the justice
secretary, had come to the
Commons to announce that the
government intended to act
against Slapps. Strategic lawsuits
against public participation are a
recent ruse used to suppress
criticism in the media.
They have proved particularly
popular with chums of the
Kremlin. Oligarchs (plus some
homegrown gargoyles), eager to
muzzle impudent British
journalists, arrange for a swanky
London lawyer to send stinky
threats. Impecunious scribes and
their publications will often play
safe and drop stories, no matter
how true and justified they be.
Halfway through the exchanges,
the deputy speaker called Bob
Seely (C, Isle of Wight). Seely, a
bright, serious bloke, Harrovian,
ex-Intelligence Corps, prone to
stripping to his Speedos and
swimming the Solent, has been a
leading backbench critic of Putin’s
Russia and its elite. He has also
developed an appetite for attacking
their “enablers”, ie their London
lawyers and accountants.
In he jumped. After praise for
Raab, he said it was a shame that
we now had “a corrupting cottage
industry of legalised intimidation
and, frankly, legalised gangsterism
being offered by unscrupulous law
firms in this country to some of the
most wretched and unscrupulous
people on Earth. I do hope that
senior partners in those firms like
Carter-Ruck, CMS, Mishcon and
Harbottle & Lewis will consider
whether they have played anentirely negative role in enabling
Kremlin neo-fascism.”
Plop. Right down the chimney.
When this sort of outrage happens,
your average plutocrat
immediately gets on to his
reputation management firm and
orders them to loose forth a
barrage of terrifying “cease and
desist” letters. Fees: scrumptious.
Countless jimmies per word. But
what is a reputation management
firm to do when its own reputation
is in danger of being blown to
smithereens? Hire itself to send a
threatening letter? Where are the
juicy fees in that?
Anyway, Seely spoke his strong
words in the Commons chamber,
where he had legal privilege. What
a damnable pencil-sucker of a
pickle. Short of despatching speed
boats to the Solent to mow down
anyone doing the doggy paddle
while wearing an Old Harrovian
bathing cap, what could be done?
Raab’s statement was briskly
delivered. Backbenchers on both
sides liked it. Angela Crawley, for
the SNP, called rich Russians’ use
of Slapps “acts of hybrid warfare”.
David Davis (C, Haltemprice &
Howden) “unreservedly
welcomed” the policy. Chris
Bryant (Lab, Rhondda): “This is
really good stuff.” Clive Efford
(Lab, Eltham), Raab’s predecessor
Sir Robert Buckland (C, South
Swindon) and the House’s ancient
mariner Barry Sheerman (Lab,
Huddersfield) made encouraging
noises. John Whittingdale (C,
Maldon) noted that Slapps were an
international pestilence. The
Maltese journalist Daphne
Caruana Galizia faced 47 lawsuits
at the time of her murder in 2017.
Whittingdale hoped other
countries would follow Raab’s
policy.
The only person to be sour?
Labour’s justice spokesman, Steve
Reed. In a rewriting of history that
would even have impressed the
boys at Russia Today, Reed
presented his party — which not
so long ago was hot to trot with the
late Max Mosley — as the free
press’s sole and ardent friends.
Reed went off on a spiel about
the Johnson government being in
bed with Putin and his cronies. He
sat down to, er, silence. Reed’s
foray followed Angela Rayner’s
antics on Wednesday and Yvette
Cooper’s tirade on Monday.
Sir Keir Starmer might want to
invite his shadow cabinet to try
bowling around the wicket for a
while.Political Sketch
The Ukrainian MPs
Maria Mezentseva,
Olena Khomenko,
Lesia Vasylenko
and Alona Shkrum
went to Downing
Street yesterday
for a meeting with
Boris JohnsonNews News xyxyxyxyxyxyWar in Ukraine