(CNN) — For 10 years, Taras Ostapchuk worked what many might consider a dream job, as the chief engineer of the Lady Anastasia, a luxurious I already 47.5-meter ship that sailed mainly from one luxury port to another across the shimmering Mediterranean Sea.
But on February 26, with the ship docked on the Spanish island of Mallorca in the Mediterranean, all that changed.
Ostapchuk saw media reports of a Russian missile attack on an apartment building in his hometown of Kyiv. It was similar to the one he lived with his wife, when he was not on board the ship.
Alexander Mikheev is the CEO of Rosoboroexport, a Russian supplier of weapons and military aircraft. He is among the Russian oligarchs sanctioned by the United States on March 15 in connection with Russia’s war against Ukraine.
At that time, he said, “I think my house may be next.” It was then that she decided to sink the yacht. “It was my first step towards war with Russia.”
In an interview with CNN from Ukraine, Ostapchuk, 55, said he connected the destruction in his hometown directly to the man he calls Lady Anastasia’s owner: the oligarch Russian Alexander Mikheev. He is the CEO of the Russian arms company Rosoboronexport, which sells everything from helicopters to tanks, missile systems and submarines.
Ostapchuk decided on his mission: to sink the Lady Anastasia.
The latest phase of Russia’s war against Ukraine had begun two days earlier, with forces attacking from Russia, Belarus and Russian-annexed Crimea. As the offensive unfolded, the US and the European Union responded with economic sanctions and the seizure of assets linked to oligarchs in Vladimir Putin’s circle.
And perhaps no asset so clearly symbolizes how Putin’s enablers had prospered under his rule as the oligarchs’ yachts, some of them almost as long as the Washington Monument, with helipads, swimming pools and extravagantly opulent interiors.
Ostapchuk said he went to the engine room of the Lady Anastasia, where he opened a valve connected to the ship’s hull. As the water flooded in, he made his way to the crew quarters, where he opened another valve.
“There were three other crew members on board besides me. I told them the ship was sinking and they had to leave,” he said in Russian.
Hide and seek with the yachts
By most standards, the Lady Anastasia, with a crew of nine, is sumptuous: a master stateroom with a Carrara marble bathroom, cabins for 10 guests, a Jacuzzi on the sundeck stabilized against the movement of the ship, etc. .
Russian oligarchs own some of the most luxurious yachts in existence. The Dilbar, a 156-meter yacht, is owned by billionaire Alisher Usmanov, according to the Treasury Department, which on March 3 identified the Dilbar as “blocked property.” It has two heliports and cabins for dozens of guests. Usmanov did not respond to CNN questions about the yacht.
Or take the Amore Vero, a yacht that French authorities seized on March 2. They say he is linked to Igor Sechin, a sanctioned Russian oil executive and Putin associate. (The company that manages the ship denies that it is owned by Sechin.) A former yacht crew member, who asked not to be identified because he had signed a confidentiality agreement, said the Amore Vero includes a safe room on its lowest level.
“It wasn’t even on the official ship plans,” he said. “There was a secret door with a hidden camera. And you could remove the wall and inside there were beds, emergency communications, a bathroom and CCTV.”
Although officials in several countries have attributed ownership of the yachts to Russian oligarchs, the paper trail between the ship and the owner is often obscure, traversing shell companies and complicated legal structures. Spain, for example, says it has “provisionally detained” yachts while it determines ownership.
Mikheev was sanctioned by the US State Department on March 15.
When CNN tried to contact Mikheev about Lady Anastasia’s property, a Rosoboronexport spokesperson responded by email that the company “never comments on any information about the personal lives of employees and their property, except in cases stipulated by the legislation of the Russian Federation”.
The yacht named ‘Lady Anastasia’, allegedly owned by Russian oligarch Alexander Mikheyev, is seen in Port Adriano on the Spanish island of Mallorca, Spain, March 15, 2022. REUTERS/Juan Medina
But Ostapchuk said he had no doubts. “Well, you know, if a creature looks like a dog, barks like a dog, bites like a dog, it’s a dog. So, if over the course of ten years, the yacht [fue] used only for vacations [por ] Mr. Mikheev and his family, so I think he is definitely the real owner of this yacht.”
Amid a growing list of sanctions and seizures, the yachts reportedly owned by Russian oligarchs have been targeted to countries where sanctions are unlikely to be applied, according to data from the MarineTraffic website.
Two yachts allegedly owned by Roman Abramovich, an oligarch and Putin ally who has been sanctioned by the European Union and the United Kingdom, docked at ports in southwestern Turkey on Monday and Tuesday. One of the yachts, the Solaris, had been docked in Barcelona until early March, while the Eclipse, one of the world’s largest yachts, left the Caribbean around the same time and crossed the Atlantic.
Both ships appeared to skirt EU waters on their way to Turkey, taking a tortuous route that circled several Greek islands. Turkey, although a member of NATO, has made it clear that it will not sanction Russia for its aggression against Ukraine.
A small group of protesters waving Ukrainian flags and chanting “no to war in Ukraine” attempted to block the Solaris from docking at a port in Bodrum, Turkey, on Monday as the massive yacht loomed over them. Some of the protesters were members of a Ukrainian youth sailing team that had left their country before the invasion to compete in a sailing competition in Turkey, the BBC reported.
Several other Russia-linked yachts appear to be heading to Middle Eastern or South Asian countries that have also refused to impose sanctions on Russia. The Clio, a yacht reportedly owned by aluminum tycoon and Putin ally Oleg Deripaska, and the Quantum Blue, reportedly owned by billionaire retailer Sergey Galitsky, were off the coast of Oman this week, MarineTraffic data shows. The Clio indicated that its destination was Dubai before changing direction to Mumbai, while the Quantum Blue had docked in Monaco before leaving in early March. Deripaska has been sanctioned by the United States and the United Kingdom, while Galitsky has not.
Meanwhile, at least half a dozen other yachts linked to Russian oligarchs have stopped transmitting location data in recent weeks, according to MarineTraffic.
The Galactica Super Nova, a yacht reportedly owned by Russian oil executive Vagit Alekperov, was last recorded leaving the port of Tivat, Montenegro, and sailing into the Adriatic Sea early on March 2, the day after the Montenegrin government announced that the EU would join in imposing sanctions on Russia. While Alekperov has not been sanctioned, he was included in a 2018 US Treasury Department list of Russian oligarchs.
Georgios Hatzimanolis, a spokesman for MarineTraffic, said the most likely explanation for the lack of location data is that the yachts have turned off AIS, an automatic tracking system. International maritime regulations generally require vessels as large as yachts linked to oligarchs to maintain AIS unless they are passing through areas known for piracy, Hatzimanolis said. Turning off a transmitter could potentially increase the danger of a collision when ships navigate busy waters.
“It’s unusual,” Hatzimanolis said of yachts going dark. “But these are unprecedented times for these yachts and their owners. They are trying to stay out of the way and get to destinations where they won’t be penalized.”
‘You have to choose’
After it began to flood the compartments, Ostapchuk told the other three crew members on board what he had done.
Before attempting to sink the Lady Anastasia as a protest against Russia’s war against Ukraine, Taras Ostapchuk served as the yacht’s chief engineer for a decade. This photo from 2013 was taken in Corsica, in the Mediterranean.
They too were Ukrainians, he said. But, fearful it would cost them their jobs, they yelled at him that he was crazy, according to a summary statement at his arraignment.
They then called the port authorities and the police. Port workers brought in a water pump and prevented the ship from sinking. Ostapchuk was arrested.
“I made a statement to the police that I tried to sink the ship as a political protest against Russian aggression,” he told CNN.
“You have to choose. Either you are with Ukraine or not. You have to choose, there will be Ukraine, or you will have a job… I don’t need a job if I don’t have Ukraine.”
In some cases, those jobs may be in jeopardy anyway. On March 15, Spanish authorities provisionally held the Lady Anastasia while they determine whether he is subject to European sanctions and can be seized. She was one of three yachts linked to Russian oligarchs that they detained that week. Others have been captured or detained in France, Germany, Italy and Gibraltar.
On March 7, the company that manages the Dilbar yacht fired all 96 crew members, saying the sanctions were preventing normal operations of the ship, according to Forbes.
The sanctions on Russian oligarchs appear to have caused challenges and confusion among some yacht crews. Seafarers’ union Nautilus International held a question and answer session with yachting professionals earlier this month and received questions such as “Should we give up all Russian yachts?” and “What am I owed if I am fired due to penalties on my vessel?” Union representatives advised members to check the terms of their contracts.
‘They should be held accountable’
When CNN spoke to Ostapchuk from Ukraine on Wednesday, the conversation was immediately interrupted by a warning of an impending Russian attack. Later, after Ostapchuk returned from a shelter, he said that as soon as Spanish authorities released him on February 27, he had returned to Ukraine.
“Now I serve in the army, and I hope that my service will help our victory,” he said.
He added that he hopes the oligarchs who backed Putin will feel the bite of the sanctions.
“They should be held responsible, because it is they who, with their behavior, with their lifestyle, with their insatiable greed, led to precisely this… To distract people from the real looting of Russia by these rulers, who they organize wars of distraction with other countries, which are innocent”.
CNN’s Drew Griffin and Yahya Abou-Ghazala contributed to this report.