A mega yacht, owned by a company linked to the boss of the Russian oil giant Rosneft, was seized Thursday in La Ciotat, near Marseille.
The Amore Vero, an 86m long white yacht, was "seized" by customs at a shipyard, the French Ministry of Economy and Finance said.
“Owned by a company of which Igor Setchine, director of Rosneft, has been identified as the main shareholder”, it “entered into the scope of the freezing measures decided against its owner” by the European Union, has added the ministry.
The boat was blocked overnight from Wednesday to Thursday, while it "was making arrangements to cast off urgently, without having completed the planned work", said French Minister of Public Accounts Olivier Dussopt, who has the responsibility of Customs.
This yacht has a swimming pool on its main deck that can be transformed into a helipad and its interior was designed by renowned interior designer Alberto Pinto, according to its builder's website.
Its value would amount to 120 million dollars, according to a source wishing to remain anonymous.
Symbols of the massive enrichment of senior Russian political and economic leaders, the yachts are among the assets they hold abroad targeted by Western sanctions due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
European sanctions target more than 500 Russian personalities or entities, whose assets and economic resources must be gradually frozen as European states manage to locate them and link them to their owners.
Read alsoUkraine: “The whole world is against you”, launches the ambassador to Putin, the UN opens an investigation into the violence
In La Ciotat, near Marseille, the French control operation took time, customs first having to verify the identity of the owner hiding behind the company which owned the ship, explains an official French source.
"The difficulty is that they are not under the Russian flag but under another flag, with behind complicated arrangements via front companies, so the job of customs is to see who is hiding behind", confirmed to the AFP a source familiar with the yachting sector.
The owners of these yachts are now trying to evade sanctions and the Maldives seem to represent a base for their ships in recent days, having no extradition treaty to the United States.
Several yachts were thus spotted on the spot: one belonging to Oleg Deripaska, the founder of the Rusal aluminum group, or the Titan, property of the steel magnate Alexander Abramov.
France has so far blocked five boats - four freighters and a yacht - as part of retaliatory measures taken after Russia invaded Ukraine.
