Dutch auction house will auction superyacht of Ukrainian oligarch

NOS News•yesterday, 7:04 PM

The Dutch auction house Troostwijk Auctions will auction the superyacht Royal Romance of the pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk. It was arrested in Croatia in 2022.

The 92.5 meter long yacht with swimming pool on board was recently transferred to Ukraine. The ship wants to sell that to raise money. Troostwijk is seen as the most suitable auction house to sell the yacht.

According to the Ukrainian government agency Asset Recovery and Management Agency (ARMA), the Royal Romance is the first sanctioned asset seized and auctioned outside Ukraine.

“This is already a big victory,” says Olena Duma of ARMA. “We believe that Medvedchuk’s yacht will now be sold in a transparent auction and thus generate significant revenue for Ukraine.”

Viktor Medvedchuk is a businessman and politician who was placed on the sanctions list by the United States in 2014 for his role in the annexation of Crimea. According to the Americans, he is a close friend of Russian President Putin. The Ukrainians also put him on the sanctions list and suspect him of high treason.

Last month, the former oil trader and lawyer was added to the Czech sanctions list. The Czechs see him as a linchpin in a Russian influence campaign through the news website Voice of Europe. European politicians were also allegedly paid from that platform.

Medvedchuk bought the Royal Romance in 2015. The five-storey superyacht was built in Makkum, Friesland, at the shipyard of shipbuilder Feadship. After delivery it came into the hands of Fregata Marine Ltd.. Research program Pointer discovered a few years later that Medvedchuk is the owner of that company from the Marshall Islands.

The ship was moored in the Croatian port city of Rijeka during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It was arrested there by local authorities in March 2022.

Russian yachts were also ‘frozen’ in the rest of Europe – including the Netherlands – due to European sanctions, but few ships have been sold since then.

“Those ships are frozen property,” says sanctions lawyer Sebastiaan Bennink. There is a lot of discussion about expropriating these types of assets. “They can’t just be taken away, because people can reclaim their property later.”

Yet this year, a Croatian judge agreed to the transfer of Medvedchuk’s ship to Ukraine. That country has now chosen to put the ship to auction with blaring texts: “Whoever buys Medvedchuk’s yacht will deal a political blow to the Putin regime and get a place on the pages of world history.”