The UK government on Wednesday imposed sanctions on two Cypriot “financial fixers” for “knowingly assisting” sanctioned Russia oligarchs to hide their assets in complex financial networks.
A damning statement named Demetris Ioannides and Christodoulos Vassiliades, for supporting Russian oligarchs Roman Abramovich and Alisher Usmanov.
“Vassiliades, a Cypriot lawyer, is at the centre of a web of trusts and offshore companies that link Usmanov and Sutton Place Estate,” the UK government said.
Ioannides is seen as responsible for crafting the “murky offshore structures” which Abramovich used to hide over £760 million assets ahead of being sanctioned following Putin’s illegal invasion of Ukraine.
“We are closing the net on the Russian elite and those who try to help them hide their money for war. There’s no place to hide. We will keep cutting them off from assets they thought were successfully hidden,” Foreign Secretary James Cleverly stressed.
The government’s statement highlighted UK experts uncovered financial networks behind the Russian oligarchs, tracing those responsible for facilitating the activities.
It is now moving to “sanction them directly with asset freezes, travel bans, transport sanctions, and trust services sanctions.”
The government has been working in partnership across Whitehall, the FCDO, HMRC, NCA, OFSI and others such as DfT, “enforcing sanctions and pursuing those who try to undermine them.”
Britain froze the assets of Abramovich and Usmanov within weeks of Russias invasion of Ukraine in February last year.
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