The end of ‘Londongrad?’ UK threatens to hit Russian oligarchs with sanctions

But decades of loose regulation and courting of Russian investors mean that some Putin allies are now The Russian government, which has amassed more than 100,000 troops along the border with Ukraine while denying that it plans to invade, described the UK threat of new sanctions as “extremely worrying.” “It’s cause for serious concern for international financial structures and businesses,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters during a conference call on Monday. “It’s an open attack on business.” How to target dirty moneyMany Russian oligarchs made their fortunes when state-owned companies were privatized in the chaos following the collapse of the Soviet Union. In London, they found an army of lawyers and bankers who were willing to help them invest in UK companies and London property, according to analysts. “Financial and professional services firms have long made the UK a comfortable home for dirty money,” experts at The UK government appears to be thinking along similar lines. On Monday, Truss said the new sanctions would allow the United Kingdom to “act swiftly in lockstep with the US and other allies to freeze assets and ban travel.”The United Kingdom has other tools at its disposal. Since 2018, the government has been able to issue Unexplained Wealth Orders, which require a targeted individual to explain how they purchased an asset. If the origin of the funds cannot be explained, the asset can be confiscated. In practice, such orders have seldom been used. They were issued in only four cases between 2018 and June 2021, according to the House of Commons Library.Sanctions with teethCritics say the government’s hands-off approach, coupled with the ability of oligarchs to use the legal system to shield themselves from scrutiny, has allowed Russian expatriates to wield huge influence in the United Kingdom.”The links of the Russian elite to the UK — especially where this involves business and investment — provide access to UK companies and political figures, and thereby a means for broad Russian influence in the UK,” the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament said in its 2020 report.”To a certain extent, this cannot be untangled and the priority now must be to mitigate the risk and ensure that, where hostile activity is uncovered, the tools exist to tackle it at source,” it continued.Even so, Kustra said the United Kingdom can help deter Moscow from ordering an invasion of Ukraine by targeting oligarchs in the country and coordinating its response with the European Union and the United States, which has the power to make Russian banks “radioactive.””Previous rounds of sanctions have been imposed symbolically, and given the very serious concerns we have over Russia dismembering one of its neighbors … it behooves the government to go and put some teeth behind these measures,” said Kustra.