February the 19th, 2024 – Russian businessman Aleksei Inkin has decided to sue the Republic of Croatia for a massive 35 million euros.
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, Russian businessman Aleksei Inkin and the owner of the company Lanelia Holdings has claims that a certain seized yacht is no longer owned by Medvedčuk, but by him, and he has filed a lawsuit against Croatia worth more than 35 million euros.
A lawsuit has been filed against the Republic of Croatia due to the seizure of the yacht “Royal Romance” whose ownership has been linked to the Russian oligarch Viktor Medvedčuk, N1 reports. To briefly recap, back at the end of January, the head of the Ukrainian Asset Recovery and Management Agency, Elena Duma, said that the court in Croatia had made a decision to return the Royal Romance to Ukraine as soon as possible, after two years spent in the Port of Trogir.
The Croatian Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs announced that “following a request for international legal assistance from the Office of the Chief Prosecutor of Ukraine, the County Court in Split seized the Royal Romance and ordered a ban on the registration of the vessel”. However, Russian businessman Aleksei Inkin and the owner of the company Lanelia Holdings claim that the yacht is no longer owned by Medvedčuk, but by him.
Inkin also believes that Croatia had no grounds to confiscate the yacht, stating that he was damaged for more than 35 million euros over two years because his ownership was illegally restricted and because he wanted to rent it out, but could not.
It’s worth noting that the Republic of Croatia asked Ukraine for additional information regarding the procedure as it is very complex and needs to be harmonised with international law. The decision will probably not come any time soon because of the red tape and complications surrounding it.
The Royal Romance, which is 92 metres long and in 101st place on the list of superyachts, is worth more than 200 million euros. It was sealed in back in 2022 while it was anchored in Rijeka, and was then taken away and moored at the Trogir shipyard. This was all done following sanctions against Russia and also at the request of the Ukrainian authorities due to the suspicion that the vessel was the property of the pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarch, former deputy and alleged godfather of Vladimir Putin’s daughter, Viktor Medvedčuk. He is accused in Ukraine of committing high treason and is also on the list of sanctioned Russian nationals in the West.
