If the EU imposed sanctions on Russia, it would feel especially in the wallets of Finns. The United States could also penalize billionaires with yachts in Germany, luxury villas in France, and luxury homes and a football team in Britain.
If war breaks out in Ukraine and Western countries impose sanctions on Russia, it may be felt above all in the Finnish economy. is following the development of the situation in this case.
Namely, the Russians are likely to immediately crack down on counter-sanctions to the West. There would be walls for both exports and imports. The energy bills of Finns could become even more expensive.
For Finland, imports from Russia are the most important of all EU countries.
There has already been widespread public debate about the kind of sanctions that Western countries could impose on Russia: banks blacklisted, the SWIFT payment system off the Russians, the denial of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, export bans.
The United States and Britain also intend to put Putin’s related party holdings and money flows on ice, say Wall Street Journal (switch to another service) -magazine. Both the oligarchs and their companies would be blacklisted.
In the same year, the United States reported (moving to another service) adding 24 businessmen to its sanctions list. Now this list would grow if Russia decides to attack Ukraine.
London is a favorite destination for Russian business people
A large amount of Russian money has settled in Britain in recent years. Russian capital (you move to another service) is in real estate, on the football team, in the media, and in universities.
Foreign minister Liz Truss swear (you switch to another service)i recently that sanctions will be imposed on oligarchs living in london if the attack on ukraine starts – even if the british economy suffers.
“Short-term economic interests cannot take precedence over maintaining freedom and democracy,” Truss said.
Boats, villas and bank accounts in EU countries
In Finland, Russian businessmen have owned both real estate and a hockey team. Read here about the Rotenberg family, who recently owned the Jokers, on the U.S. sanctions list.
The major owner of Helsinki’s Hartwall Arena is still Arena Events, which has Russian businessmen in the background. Gennady Tymoshenko and Roman Rotenberg.
At the end of last year, for example, German shipyards had luxury yachts from numerous Russian businessmen in storage and under refurbishment. In addition to Putin’s yachts themselves, the port of Hamburg had boats for at least four Russian billionaire businessmen.
Above all, Russian billions have been brought to Cyprus by the country’s “golden passport” system, where foreigners could obtain the country’s citizenship for an investment of two million euros.
The French Riviera is one of the favorite destinations for Russian billionaires. They have both luxury accommodation from Cannes to Menton and yachts in the port of Saint-Tropez.
Russian oligarchs most often invest their assets abroad in securities, real estate, companies, the stock market, the luxury lifestyle and gold and jewelery, according to the consulting company Ernst & Young. in the settlement (you move to another service) year before last.
“The super-rich don’t want war”
In recent days, the Ukrainian anti-corruption organization has demanded that European countries freeze the assets of the oligarchs and prevent them from moving within their territory. The Antac organization lists the assets of Russian billionaires on Twitter under the tag # BlockPutinWallets.
There are sanctions for businessmen required (go to another service) also a Russian opposition politician lurking in prison Alexei Navalnyi. So far, the EU has not sanctioned the oligarchs in any way.
Putin’s war intentions are an oligarch’s nightmare, says Center for European Policy Analysis in their analysis (you switch to another service). This is precisely because their wealth is in the West.
– They will probably do their best to avoid being on the new sanctions list, a researcher specializing in Russia Ksenija Kirillova write.
Ukrainian media (switch to another service) according to many Russian-minded businessmen there have left Kiev on charter flights and private planes to, for example, Vienna, Munich and Zurich in recent days.
The EU could also work to strengthen the prevention of money laundering. Several data leaks in recent years have shown that a lot of Russian money is still circulating through the banking systems of Luxembourg, Cyprus and Latvia, for example.
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