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$700m superyacht linked to putin seized by italy.

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A $700 million luxury yacht linked to Russian President Vladimir Putin was impounded by Italy Friday, authorities said.

The government order to seize the luxurious six-deck Scheherazade came as it appeared ready to set sail from the port of Marina di Carrara, according to recent dock activity.

The owner of the ship — which boasts two helicopter landing pads, 22 cabins, a full spa and an indoor pool that doubles as a dance floor — was believed to be Eduard Khudainatov, the former chief of Russian energy giant Rosneft, law enforcement sources said.

Khudainatov is not a current target of European Union war sanctions, but Rome had seized the vessel anyways while appealing Brussels to add him to EU embargoes.

Officials did not name Khudainatov in a statement, saying only the owner of the yacht was tied to “prominent elements of the Russian government.”

US officials told The New York Times the “prominent element” is Putin.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had urged Italian lawmakers to confiscate the pleasure ship in March as part of efforts across the continent to pressure Putin and his loyalists to end their unprovoked war on his country.

Italy seized nearly a billion dollars worth of yachts and villas owned by Russians following Zelensky’s address.

On Thursday, Fiji’s government seized a massive $325 million yacht owned by a Russian oligarch at the request of the US.

Three days before, the US impounded a $90 million ship tied to a Putin associate in Spain.

With Post wires

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Italy won't say who's paying for the care of a $700 million superyacht tied to Putin

Dustin Jones

The Scheherazade, a 460-foot superyacht, has been held in Italy since May 2022 in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It is believed to have ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Laura Lezza/Getty Images hide caption

The Scheherazade, a 460-foot superyacht, has been held in Italy since May 2022 in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It is believed to have ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Scheherazade superyacht was impounded by the Italian government in May 2022 in response to Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Instead of falling into disrepair, Italy has allowed its owner to maintain and refit the vessel, but it won't disclose who is footing the bill.

The Financial Times reported on Sunday that the vessel has been held at port in Marina di Carrara, located almost 90 miles northwest of Florence, since it was impounded by authorities in the spring of 2022. For over a year, the Italian government has permitted the owner to continue paying for the ship's staff, its maintenance and refitting of the vessel. But Italy won't identify the owner.

Italy's Finance Ministry said in a May 2022 news release that the superyacht had "significant economic and business links" with "prominent elements of the Russian government" but didn't name the owner of the ship.

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According to the website SuperYachtFan , the 460-foot superyacht belongs to Russian billionaire Eduard Khudainatov. However, Bloomberg News reported in 2022 that he is a "straw owner" of the superyacht — as well as another ship — and that the Scheherazade actually belongs to Putin.

The Financial Times reported that the Scheherazade has 22 cabins, two helicopter decks and a spa and that it's being refitted by the Italian Sea Group. NPR reached out to the Italian Sea Group for comment but did not hear back before publication.

The United States created Task Force KleptoCapture in the wake of Putin's war against Ukraine, aiming to hold Russian oligarchs accountable for evading sanctions. In its one year of operation, the task force has brought charges to at least 35 individuals and entities, NPR previously reported.

Part of those efforts included seizing luxury items belonging to billionaires with ties to the Kremlin. This includes items like a 348-foot yacht seized in Fiji in May 2022, which is valued at about $300 million and is now sitting in San Diego.

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‘Mysterious’: the $700m superyacht in Italy some say belongs to Putin

Activists linked to Alexei Navalny believe the Scheherazade is owned by the Russian president

F or several months, the mysterious 140-metre-long, six-floor superyacht has towered over the smaller boats in the shipyard in Marina di Carrara, a town on Italy’s Tuscan coast, arousing chatter among its people over the identity of its wealthy owner.

“It’s the largest yacht I’ve ever seen here,” said Suzy Dimitrova, who owns a boat in the marina. “There are people cleaning it all the time. The last time I saw it leave [the shipyard] was last year. We’re all wondering who the owner is.”

The Scheherazade, said to be worth $700m (£528m), is under investigation by Italian authorities for potential links to sanctioned Russians. And activists working with the jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny are in no doubt that the yacht is owned by the Russian president Vladimir Putin .

On Monday, investigative journalist Maria Pevchikh and anti-corruption activist Georgy Alburov said that all crew members, obtained from a list dating December 2020, were Russian, apart from the captain. In a video published on YouTube, they claimed that some of the yacht’s staff worked for the Russia’s Federal Protective Service (FSO), an agency that manages security for high-ranking officials including Putin.

The activists, who have urged Italian authorities to seize the yacht, said this information proves it belongs to Putin. “They are Russian state employees, military personnel, and they regularly travel to Italy as a group to work on the mysterious yacht,” Pevchikh wrote on Twitter.

The interior of the vessel was described as being equipped with a spa, swimming pools, two helipads, a wood-burning fireplace and a pool table designed to tilt so as to reduce the impact of the waves.

In an address to the Italian parliament on Tuesday, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged Italy to seize the yacht, adding that Putin and his wealthy supporters often holidayed in Italy and should have their assets blocked.

“Don’t be a resort for murderers,” he said. “Lock all their real estate, accounts and yachts – from the Scheherazade to the smallest ones.”

Putin’s last official visit to Italy was in 2019, at the invitation of the former prime minister, Giuseppe Conte. He also held talks with Pope Francis at the Vatican during the visit.

Marina di Carrara is close to Forte dei Marmi, a favourite holiday destination for Russian oligarchs, many of whom have bought villas and beach resorts.

In early March, Italian police seized a yacht owned by Alexei Mordashov, the richest man in Russia before being blacklisted by the European Union, and another owned by Gennady Timchenko, a billionaire with close ties to Putin , in the Ligurian port of Imperia.

The yacht can only be seen through a fence, where it is continuing to undergo a refit, scheduled to be completed next year, in a shipyard owned by The Italian Sea Group, a company that refits and builds luxury yachts.

The mystery over its owner gathered momentum in early March, when finance police in Carrara boarded the yacht as EU sanctions against Russian oligarchs kicked in over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine .

The police seized ownership documents from the yacht’s British captain, Guy Bennett-Pearce. At the time, US officials told the New York Times that they were also investigating whether the yacht belonged to Putin.

The Italian Sea Group said in a statement that it was continuing to work on the ship’s €6m (£5m) refit and maintenance despite the EU’s sanctions and that, according to documents in its possession, the vessel “is not attributable to the property of the Russian president Vladimir Putin”, and neither is it owned by a Russian on the sanction list.

A source at the finance police unit in Carrara said that they are now aware who the owner is and will soon make an announcement.

An investigation by La Stampa newspaper earlier this month had linked the vessel to Eduard Yurievich Khudainatov, the former president of the Russian state oil firm Rosneft, via a shell company registered in the Marshall Islands.

But Italian police are reportedly certain that Khudainatov is not the yacht’s real owner. “He seems to be a man connected with Putin’s inner circle but not so rich as to own a yacht like the Scheherazade,” said Jacopo Iacoboni, the journalist for La Stampa who carried out the investigation.

Until the Italian police reveal their findings, the people of Marina di Carrara continue to ponder, even if its presence causes concern. “Putin is the presumed owner, and looking at it now causes me a lot of anxiety because of what he is doing in Ukraine,” said Maria Cristina.

However, there are no signs of protests being planned. “There are always a lot of words, but little action here,” said Dimitrova.

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'Putin's £570m superyacht' seized by Italy over fears it may sail to international waters

7 May 2022, 07:41 | Updated: 7 May 2022, 12:49

By Sophie Barnett

A £570m superyacht said to be owned by Vladimir Putin has been seized by Italian authorities just as it appeared to be preparing to set sail.

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The Scheherazade has been undergoing repairs at a port in Marina di Carrara, off the coast of Tuscany, since September last year and is reported to belong to the Russian president.

The 140-metre yacht, which has gold-plated taps, a swimming pool, spas and two helicopter pads, and is reportedly worth £570million ($700m), has been linked to Putin despite denials from the shipyard hosting it.

It is being seized under EU sanctions brought over Russia's invasion of Ukraine that have seen other vessels confiscated.

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In a statement on Friday night, Italy's finance ministry said that the boat's owner had ties to "prominent elements of the Russian government".

The late night announcement came after fears grew that The Scheherazde was about to slip away and head to international waters and avoid any possible sanctions.

The statement did not name the owner of the vessel, but said the ministry had asked the EU to place the individual on to the sanctions list. The yacht has been blocked pending the adoption of further restrictive measures.

US officials told the New York Times that the ship - which has been the subject of an investigation by the Italian financial police since the end of March - could belong to Russia's president.

Investigative journalists and supporters of the imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny have also linked the vessel to President Putin.

Other reports suggest the ship may belong to Eduard Khudainatov, a Russian oil tycoon who has not been hit by sanctions. He is the former chairman and chief executive of Rosneft, the state-owned Russian company that deals in oil and gas.

Read more: 'Ukraine will win': Boris gets standing ovation as first leader to address Kyiv Parliament

The decision to seize the Cayman islands registered yacht came after Navalny supporter Maria Pevchikh posted on Twitter:" Ok guys we have a problem, Putin's secret $700 million yacht is about to escape sanctions by simply taking off from Italy.

"It's a matter of days now. The Italian authorities are doing nothing to stop it. So we should."

The six-deck Scheherazade is one of the largest and most-expensive privately-owned boats in the world - with space equivalent to two apartment blocks.

The yacht has room for 18 guests in nine luxury cabins in addition to a crew of 40, residing in 20 cabins.

Some oligarchs placed under sanctions after Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24 have sought safer waters for their mega-yachts. Roman Abramovich has sent two vessels to Turkey.

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The Russian crew aboard Putin’s suspected superyacht have abandoned their jobs on the $700 million boat

The Russian crew aboard a $700 million yacht named Scheherazade with potential links to President Putin have abandoned their jobs aboard the ship, as first reported by The New York Times . 

Allegedly, due to obligations and personal conflicts related to the ongoing Russian war , all employees vacated their posts. Following the departure of all the Russian crew members, a British crew has stepped in instead .

The ship’s captain, Guy, who is also British, previously denied to The New York Times that the Scheherazade was owned by Putin and alleged that the Russian president had never been aboard the ship. 

The ship has not been legally seized by Italian or European Union authorities , but is under scrutiny. Officials will not make further comments until the conclusion of an investigation by the Italian authorities, according to The New York Times . 

Superyacht under scrutiny

The Scheherazade is currently docked at the Marina di Carrara in Italy, and does not have a publicly identified owner . Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the 459 foot superyacht was manned by at least 20 crew members which included approximately 10 Russian officers , since the fall of 2020 .

Some of the ship’s employees were identified as FSO—or Federal Guard Service— personnel, who are tasked with protecting the Russian President, according to a YouTube video posted by two activists, investigative journalist Maria Pevchikh and the anti-corruption activist Georgy Alburov, on Monday. The yacht itself is enormous, and contains two helipads, a spa, three saunas, a swimming pool , and other luxury amenities. 

Luxury yachts like the Scheherazade are being seized all over Europe, with countries like Italy and France impounding the nautical status symbols as a part of sanctions against Russia, following its invasion of Ukraine . France has seized several Russian yachts worth hundreds of millions of dollars , and Germany has also impounded multiple luxury Russian yachts, with one notable seizure being valued at nearly $600 million . Italy has also seized Russian yachts valued at over $500 million.

In Italy, France, and Germany, $1 billion in Russian boats have been taken from sanctioned individuals so far. 

Sanctions hitting yachts, jets, and mansions.

While Putin is being widely criticized as a “ war criminal ,” and facing mounting public backlash, he is not alone in facing social and financial consequences.

The sanctions imposed against Russia are meant not only to hurt the Russian president, but his inner circle of oligarchs as well. The private jets, mansions, and yachts that are seized by worldwide governments are considered frozen assets but could ultimately lead to financial gains for Ukraine.

In a bipartisan bill called the “Yachts for Ukraine Act,” the authorities would be permitted to seize the assets of Russian elites valued over $5 million and sell them to provide humanitarian support, weapons and refugee assistance to Ukraine.

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France Seizes Yacht Linked to Vladimir Putin’s Best Buddy Igor Sechin

By Bess Levin

Since Russian president Vladimir Putin decided to invade Ukraine , everyone from the U.S. to the U.K. to the famously neutral Switzerland have hit Russia with crippling, unprecedented economic sanctions. Key Russian banks have been kicked off of SWIFT, the network that connects financial institutions around the globe. The U.S. Treasury Department, as well as its European allies, have prohibited anyone from doing business with Russia’s Central Bank, finance ministry, and wealth fund. Russian flights have been banned from entering American, European, and Canadian airspaces. And in a move that has no doubt kept extremely wealthy Russians up at night, weeping into their blinis and frantically moving whatever they can offshore, Putin’s rich friends have been personally sanctioned, meaning they can say “do svidanie” to their very fancy toys and large stacks of cash.

On Thursday, France seized a yacht linked to  Igor Sechin, the CEO of Russian oil giant Rosneft, one of the world’s largest crude oil producers. The yacht, named Amore Vero, was  impounded  in the French Mediterranean port of La Ciotat, where it was  scheduled  to depart on April 1, according to French24. On Twitter,  Olivier Dussopt, the French minister of public action and accounts,  posted  a photo of the 280-foot vessel—which is reportedly outfitted with a “swimming pool that turns into a helipad.” He wrote: “As part of the implementation of European Union sanctions against Russia and in support of Ukraine, we seized a first yacht.” Earlier this week, French foreign minister  Jean-Yves Le Drian  told reporters: “If I were an oligarch, in Russia or France, I’d be worried.” And apparently, he wasn’t kidding!

What exactly does Sechin have to do with Putin, you might be wondering? Here’s how the European Union described him last month:

Sechin is…one of Vladimir Putin’s most trusted and closest advisors, as well as his personal friend. He has been in contact with the Russian President on a daily basis. He is considered to be one of the most powerful members of the Russian political elite. His connections to Vladimir Putin are long and deep. He worked with the President in the St Petersburg mayor’s office in the 1990s and has proved his loyalty ever since. In 1999 Mr. Sechin became Vladimir Putin’s deputy head of his administration, in 2008 deputy Prime Minister, and in 2012 Rosneft’s CEO. He is one of the Russian oligarchs operating in partnership with the Russian state.

According to the E.U., Sechin is “among those people from Putin’s circle who receive financial gains and important assignments in return for subordination and loyalty.” Among other tasks assigned to him by Putin, Sechin was apparently “involved in financing the vineyards of the palace complex near Gelendzhik, which is considered to be personally used by” the Russian president. Sechin, the E.U. account also reads, “actively supported…and benefited from Russian decision-makers responsible for the annexation of Crimea and the destabilisation of Ukraine. Furthermore, Rosneft Aero, a subsidiary of Rosneft of which Mr. Sechin is CEO, delivers jet fuel to the Simferopol Airport which provides air flight connection between the territory of the illegally annexed Crimea and Sevastopol and Russia…he is supporting the consolidation of the illegally annexed Crimean peninsula into the Russian Federation, which in turn further undermines the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine.” Sechin has been called “Darth Vader” and the “scariest person on earth.” So you can probably understand why other countries want to crack down on the guy, as (1) he appears to be a clear and present threat to Ukraine and (2) he’s conceivably in a position to call up his buddy Vlad and complain (though, according to reports, the Russian president “ doesn‘t really care ” about sanctions, whether they’re on the state or his pals.)

In other yacht-seizure news, German authorities have reportedly confiscated a boat belonging Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov. At 512 feet and 15,917 tons, Dilbar is the largest motor yacht in the world, according to Forbes. After his assets were frozen by the European Union this week, Usmanov complained he was the victim of character assassination, saying in a statement: “I believe such a decision is unfair, and the reasons employed to justify the sanctions are a set of false and defamatory allegations damaging my honor, dignity, and business reputation.”

— ​​Images of Russia’s Attack on Ukraine —Trump Calls Putin’s Ukraine Moves “Genius” Because He Hates Democracy — The Zucker-Cuomo Saga Just Got Even Messier — Why Biden Wanted Americans to Know Exactly What Putin Was Planning — It’s Been a Hell of a Week for Letitia James — “If Ukraine Matters, Tell Us Why”: Joe Biden Is Talking to Everyone Except the American People — Republicans on Russia Crisis: It’s Biden’s Fault — Thieves in the Night: A Vast Burglary Ring From Chile Has Been Targeting Wealthy U.S. Households — Watergate’s Central Mystery: Why Did Nixon’s Team Order the Break-In in the First Place? — From the Archive: Russia’s Dark Master — Not a subscriber? Join Vanity Fair to receive full access to VF.com and the complete online archive now.

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How Will Putin Respond to the Terrorist Attack in Moscow?

By Joshua Yaffa

On Friday night, at least four men stormed Crocus City Hall, a concert venue in Moscow’s northwestern outskirts, gunning down victims as they ran, screaming, through the building’s cavernous foyer. Those trapped inside captured the grim scene on their cell phones: assailants fanning out with weapons drawn, bursts of automatic gunfire, bodies slumped on the floor. The attackers set fire to the auditorium, a blaze that spread quickly. Smoke and flames engulfed the building. According to a Telegram channel close to Russian law enforcement, police found twenty-eight bodies in a single bathroom; another fourteen were recovered in an emergency stairwell. In total, a hundred and thirty-seven people are dead—the most killed by an act of terror in Russia since 2004, when more than three hundred people were killed after militants seized a school in Beslan.

The act of terror was, above all, exactly that: a ghoulish spasm of violence reminiscent of the worst attacks in Europe in recent years, such as the storming of the Bataclan theatre , in Paris, in 2015, where a hundred and thirty people were killed. But in Russia, after twenty-four years of Vladimir Putin’s rule—he just extended his reign by another six years in elections last week—and two years into its war with Ukraine , the attack may carry its own political significance.

Lapses in security can be especially problematic for would-be strongmen. After all, Putin’s implicit appeal to the Russian people rests on the very idea of a muscular, unified, well-resourced state capable of protecting them. He began his rise to power on the back of a brutal counter-insurgency campaign in Chechnya, and now implores the nation not only to rally around the conflict with Ukraine but to participate in what he presents as an era-defining struggle against a collective West intent on Russia’s destruction.

Friday night’s attack is an awful, and uncomfortable, swerve from that narrative. Within hours, an ISIS affiliate known as ISIS-K (the “K” stands for Khorasan province, a reference to Afghanistan and other parts of Central Asia) claimed that its fighters were responsible for “killing and wounding hundreds and causing great destruction to the place before they withdrew to their bases safely.” ISIS-K , which has carried out terror attacks in Afghanistan and Iran, has long targeted Russia in its rhetoric, citing the Kremlin’s extensive bombing campaign in Syria and its fight against militants in the Muslim-majority Russian republics in the North Caucasus. Earlier this month, Russian security services killed two men who, officials said, were planning to carry out an attack on a Moscow synagogue on behalf of ISIS-K . Over the weekend, ISIS -affiliated social-media channels released gruesome body-cam footage, which shows the terrorists firing at people inside the hall; one of them approaches a wounded man lying on the ground and slits his throat with a knife. A voice yells, “Kill them! Show no mercy!” and “The infidels will be defeated.”

The attack appeared to fit with a scenario U.S. intelligence agencies had been warning about for weeks. In early March, the U.S. Embassy in Russia said it was “monitoring reports that extremists have imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow,” including concerts. On Friday, Adrienne Watson, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, confirmed the existence of such intelligence, adding that “the U.S. Government also shared this information with Russian authorities in accordance with its longstanding ‘duty to warn’ policy.”

Putin, however, seems to have dismissed this alert as a ruse or a provocation. At a meeting with top F.S.B. officials just three days before the terror attack, Putin addressed the intelligence warnings from Western governments. “All this resembles outright blackmail and the intention to intimidate and destabilize our society,” he said. In his remarks to the F.S.B., Putin was much more focussed on the war in Ukraine (“The most critical and intense aspect of your work today is undoubtedly related to the special military operation”) and linked any mention of the terrorist threats to efforts by the West to weaken Russia (“the same Western special services which are behind their manifestations”).

A horrific—and, in some ways, predictable— ISIS attack that shatters a sense of security in Russia’s capital does not fit with Putin’s political obsessions. Members of Russia’s vast security apparatus are first and foremost agents of regime protection. The Islamic State is included on the country’s register of terrorist and extremist organizations, but so is the political network of Alexei Navalny , who died in a Russian prison last month. On Friday, the day of the attack, the Kremlin added what it vaguely refers to as the worldwide “LGBT movement” to the same list.

In February, a report by the investigative-news site Proekt, which the Russian state has deemed “undesirable,” counted ten thousand people who faced criminal prosecution in politically motivated cases in the course of Putin’s current six-year Presidential term—surpassing the comparable figures under the Soviet leaders Nikita Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev. Ruslan Leviev, an open-source researcher who was convicted in absentia for his coverage of Russian military operations and is now based in the U.S., remarked, “In a country where counterterrorist special forces are chasing commentators from the Internet who said something wrong about Putin or wrote about Bucha, terrorists will always feel free.”

Unsurprisingly, Putin has tried to connect what, by all accounts, is an act of ISIS terror to Ukraine. In a nationwide address on Saturday, he spoke of a “horrific and savage act of terrorism” but never mentioned by name the actual group— ISIS —that had claimed responsibility. “They attempted to escape and were heading toward Ukraine,” he said of the four suspects, adding that “a window was prepared for them on the Ukrainian side to cross the state border.” An F.S.B. statement said that the suspects had “appropriate contacts” in Ukraine. Meduza, an independent Russian outlet, reported that the Kremlin had instructed state media to emphasize “traces” of Ukrainian involvement in the attack.

It has become fashionable to label every attack inside Russia as a false flag, a decoy operation launched by Russia’s security services. (Ukraine’s own military intelligence agency went for this theory, calling Friday’s attack “a planned and deliberate provocation by the Russian special services at the behest of Putin.”) There is compelling, if far from conclusive, evidence of involvement by the F.S.B. in a series of apartment bombings, in 1999, that paved the way for Putin to become President. But, in the years since, the truth is often more banal: the Putin state directs incredible resources to, and has become quite proficient at, protecting itself, but is less capable—perhaps even less interested—in protecting those over whom it rules.

As for what Putin does now, the 2004 terrorist attack in Beslan may be instructive. In the aftermath of that tragedy, Putin moved not to reform Russia’s security agencies, for example, or to hold an independent inquiry on the security forces’ decision to fire heavy explosives at the school but, rather, to roll back nascent democratic reforms. The Kremlin cancelled direct elections of regional governors in favor of Presidential appointments; it also abolished single-mandate districts in the Duma, removing the last independent voices in parliament. All of which is to say, an attack does not have to be a planned provocation for Putin to look to spin it to his political advantage.

Still, it’s hard to imagine the Kremlin doing more to empower the F.S.B. in its hunt for enemies, real or imagined, or to further erode Russia’s democratic institutions. Similarly, can Russia realistically escalate its attacks on Ukrainian cities and civilian infrastructure, given that, on Friday, hours before the terror attack, dozens of Russian missile and drone strikes hit energy facilities across the country? Putin could instead try to have Russians forget about the horrors at Crocus City Hall, or at least move on without much fanfare, lest they arrive at difficult questions for him and the state. Or he may attempt, as he did in the first hours after the attack, to replace the prospect of real evil with a more suitable enemy. Wartime creates its own logic of expediency; the same is true for late-stage autocracies obsessed with their survival. Putin, then, may well indeed find a response to the massacre, even if it has little to do with those who carried it out. ♦

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By Benjamin Wallace-Wells

By Jon Lee Anderson

By Robin Wright

Putin sees Kyiv in Moscow terrorist attack. But ISIS is its own story.

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After a hideous slaughter in Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin is still intent on pointing the finger at Kyiv . It’s been five days since Russia experienced its worst terrorist attack in two decades, when a clutch of Islamist gunmen burst into a crowded concert venue in the capital, opened fire and set the hall ablaze, killing at least 139 people. The extremist Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the assault, but Kremlin officials continue to gesture to their more immediate enemy — a Ukrainian government that has resisted Russia’s costly and bloody full-scale invasion for more than two years.

“We know that the crime was committed by radical Islamists,” Putin acknowledged in a televised government meeting Monday evening, before taking an angrier, conspiratorial turn. “We also know that the U.S. via various channels tries to persuade their satellites and other countries that, according to their intel, there is allegedly no Kyiv trace in the Moscow terrorist attack and that it was carried out by members of ISIS.”

Never mind the prevalence of extremist Islamist plots in Russia, nor Putin’s own long history in helping battle and ruthlessly quash Islamist insurgencies at home and abroad. For a regime that has staked much of its credibility and political future on the war in Ukraine, Putin and his Kremlin allies need to keep the domestic focus on the perfidy of the foes next door.

“The question that arises is who benefits from this?” Putin went on to say . “This atrocity may be just a link in a whole series of attempts by those who have been at war with our country since 2014 by the hands of the neo-Nazi Kyiv regime.”

Ukrainian officials angrily dismissed Putin’s casting of blame. “Those hundreds of thousands of Russians who are now killing on Ukrainian land would surely be enough to stop any terrorists,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said over the weekend , suggesting Putin was desperate to gloss over his regime’s security failures. “And if the Russians are ready to silently die in ‘Crocus Halls’” — a reference to the site of the attack — “and not ask any questions to their security and intelligence agencies, then Putin will try to turn such a situation to his personal advantage again.”

U.S. officials extended a warning to Russian authorities two weeks before the attacks, revealing that their intelligence assets suspected a militant strike could be imminent. But Putin publicly scoffed at the advice as “an attempt to frighten and destabilize our society.” The irony, veteran Russia analyst Anatol Lieven noted , is that for all its antipathy for the Kremlin, “Washington never killed a single Russian citizen” over the past three decades. But “over this period,” he added, “Islamist terrorists have killed hundreds of Russian citizens, at Vladikavkaz in 1999, 2008, and 2010; the Dubrovka theater in Moscow in 2002, the Beslan school in 2004, and now again in Moscow.”

The current moment is unlikely to provoke much soul-searching in the Kremlin. “It’s clear that we will search for Ukrainian fingerprints and possibly those of Western security services,” a Russian academic connected to the Russian security establishment told my colleagues, speaking on the condition of anonymity because Putin’s regime often retaliates against critics. “But probably any investigation will find failures by our security services.”

Russian authorities have seized four suspects implicated in the attack. All are nationals from Tajikistan who were in the country as migrant workers.

The Islamic State is a shadow of what it was a bit less than a decade ago , when its extremist adherents exploited Syria’s civil war to carve out their own rump state in the middle of Iraq and Syria. But though it may have lost its putative “caliphate,” Islamic State offshoots have spread across the world. The faction believed to be behind the Moscow attack is the Islamic State-Khorasan, or ISIS-K — the Pakistan and Afghanistan-based branch of the terrorist group. ISIS-K has drawn heavily from migrants and fighters from Central Asia and has long trained its sights on Russia , which is reviled by Islamists for its brutal counterinsurgency in Chechnya and defense of the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

“ISIS-K appears to have assumed the mantle as chief avenger,” my colleagues Joby Warrick, Robyn Dixon and Souad Mekhennet reported . “In September 2022, ISIS-K claimed responsibility for a bomb attack outside the Russian Embassy in Kabul, which killed two employees and three other people. Last year, ISIS-K set up a Tajik-language propaganda network, ramping up efforts to recruit members in autocratic Central Asian states, which the group portrays as Moscow’s puppets. Multiple Telegram channels in Tajik, Uzbek and Russian transmit Islamic State propaganda and glorify Tajik militants who have taken part in attacks in Afghanistan, Iran, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.”

Further afield, outfits linked to the Islamic State have claimed responsibility for more than 1,100 attacks that killed or wounded nearly 5,000 people globally in just the past 12 months. It’s a glaring reminder of the reach and continued menace of terrorist group that former president Donald Trump claimed had been wholly defeated in 2019.

The Islamic State “has continued to thrive in other parts of the world, regions that perhaps most people don’t care about too much,” noted Kabir Taneja of the Observer Research Foundation , a leading Indian think tank. That may have made “the threat seem less, lax, or impotent,” he added, but the group’s offshoots “in Afghanistan, the African Sahel, Mozambique, and even continuing in Syria, have been slowly gnawing their way into prominence in these parts of the world.”

Back in Putin’s Russia, the mood seems dark. Many Central Asian migrants have for months been facing police intimidation and the risk of being gang-pressed into joining the war in Ukraine. Their position is all the more precarious after the terrorist attack. “Over the past year, the situation in Russia has been difficult,” a Tajik migrant in Moscow identified as Atovullo told the Eurasianet news website . “Constant [police raids on migrants], they treat you like you’re a criminal. Now it’s impossible to walk down the street, everyone is wary of you, avoiding you. They can just simply evict you, like you’re a dog.”

Kremlin officials have vowed sweeping punishments. Former president Dmitry Medvedev, who is now deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, said the detained suspects will probably be executed. “But it is much more important to kill everyone involved. Everyone,” he said . “who paid them, who sympathized with them, who helped them. Kill them all.”

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The Editorial Board

Jailed in Putin’s Russia for Speaking the Truth

By The Editorial Board

The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values . It is separate from the newsroom.

The Committee to Protect Journalists has documented that at least 320 members of the press were behind bars around the globe as 2024 began. In Vladimir Putin’s police state, at least 22 journalists are jailed, most for committing that most elemental of journalistic duties, speaking the truth. Two of them are American reporters. One of them, Evan Gershkovich of The Wall Street Journal, will soon mark a year in the infamous Lefortovo prison , awaiting trial on charges of espionage. The other, Alsu Kurmasheva , an editor for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, was arrested while visiting her mother and has been in detention since October.

The charges against both are a travesty. Their incarceration is a violation of their rights and an assault on foreign journalists that is even more egregious than what transpired under Soviet rule. The Biden administration should continue to do all in its power to secure their freedom.

Mr. Gershkovich, now 32, is not a spy, and his accusers know it. He is a reporter, a correspondent for The Wall Street Journal who worked in Moscow with official accreditation from the Russian government until he was taken prisoner by a secretive police unit in Yekaterinburg on March 29, 2023.

The reason for the arrest may be known only to Mr. Putin. Perhaps it was to send a signal that foreign correspondents are no safer from the reach of the Kremlin’s police than Russian reporters. For some time now, and especially since the invasion of Ukraine two years ago, the Kremlin under Mr. Putin has dealt ruthlessly with any opposition, as demonstrated most starkly by the sudden death last month of Aleksei Navalny, Mr. Putin’s most prominent opponent.

Perhaps Mr. Gershkovich was seized as a pawn to swap for Russians held in the West, as the American basketball player Brittney Griner was in 2022 . Perhaps it was because Mr. Gershkovich’s parents are Russian Jews who emigrated in the 1970s, so Mr. Putin views him, as he views Ukraine, as within his sphere of repression.

As the first anniversary of Mr. Gershkovich’s incarceration approaches, there is no evidence of a potential trade, though Mr. Putin did suggest last month that it could happen. And there is no indication that a trial is imminent. Instead, Mr. Gershkovich will soon have spent a year at Lefortovo , which was built in the 19th century and was notorious in the Soviet era as an interrogation center for political prisoners, who are typically held in solitary confinement. Human contact is strictly limited: Only lawyers are usually allowed to visit.

Ms. Kurmasheva, a dual Russian and American citizen, lived with her husband and two daughters in Prague and worked there as an editor for R.F.E./R.L.’s Tatar-Bashkir service. She traveled to the Russian city of Kazan last May to visit her ailing mother but was prevented from leaving, purportedly for failing to register her American passport. On Oct. 18 she was detained for failing to register as a “foreign agent,” and she has been held since.

Introduced in 2012, the foreign agent law has been a central feature of Mr. Putin’s efforts to portray the West as a devious enemy seeking to undermine Russia. The law requires any organization or individual in Russia who receives money from abroad to register as a “foreign agent,” a phrase that, in Russian, carries a clear connotation of espionage. In December, authorities in Kazan began yet another investigation of Ms. Kurmasheva, this one for spreading false information about the Russian Army, and on Feb. 1, her pretrial detention was extended for two months.

Her husband, Pavel Butorin, who also works for R.F.E./R.L., has said he suspects the new case involves a book that Ms. Kurmasheva and her colleagues coedited called “Saying No to War: 40 Stories of Russians Who Oppose the Russian Invasion of Ukraine,” a collection of radio interviews with Russian people who expressed their antiwar feelings in different ways. (One of them said she was arrested for braiding a green ribbon in her hair.) Opposing the war is a crime in Russia, and R.F.E./R.L. itself has been branded an “undesirable organization,” putting Russians at risk for any connection with it.

Mr. Butorin and a host of press organizations have been campaigning for the State Department to declare that Ms. Kurmasheva has been wrongfully detained — a finding that would allow her to receive intensified attention by the president’s special presidential envoy for hostage affairs. Mr. Gershkovich’s case was so categorized soon after he was detained, as was that of another American being held in Russia, Paul Whelan , who was convicted in 2020 of spying and sentenced to 16 years of incarceration. The State Department has yet to officially assign similar urgency to Ms. Kurmasheva’s case, but it should.

However different the details of Mr. Gershkovich’s and Ms. Kurmasheva’s cases, they both have their origins in Mr. Putin’s personal vindictiveness. In the waning years of the Soviet Union, the rules of officially acceptable behavior for foreign journalists were fairly clear and the consequences for violating them were rarely more serious than expulsion. Mr. Putin’s approach to the international media — now among the only sources of independent news in the country — has become steadily more malevolent and capricious as his war on Ukraine has dragged on.

Mr. Putin, having yet again consolidated his power as Russia’s leader, is unlikely to be moved by the American government’s pressure or censure about his treatment of journalists. Yet it remains incumbent on the United States government and on institutions of the free press to explore every avenue to win the release of Ms. Kurmasheva and Mr. Gershkovich and to continue to insist, using whatever diplomatic tools are available to them, that Mr. Putin cease intimidating journalists.

Journalists in Russia who are working to break through the obstacles and traps he has set are performing a critical service in shedding light on his authoritarian and expansionist project. He fears them for a reason, and for that same reason they deserve the unflagging support of all those who cherish freedom.

Source photograph by wabeno, via Getty Images.

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Ukraine used a Neptune missile to attack its own warship that Russia stole a decade ago

• Ukraine carried out a massive attack on Russia's Black Sea Fleet over the weekend.
• Days later, Kyiv revealed that it struck the Konstantin Olshansky landing ship with a missile.
• Russian forces stole this vessel from Ukraine a decade ago during the annexation of Crimea.

Ukraine fired a missile at the warship that Russia stole from the country a decade ago, Kyiv revealed, offering new details about a large attack on Moscow's Black Sea Fleet that unfolded over the weekend.

The Ukrainian defense ministry said on Tuesday that its forces used a homemade Neptune anti-ship missile to strike the Konstantin Olshansky. Russia had seized this decades-old landing ship, alongside much of Kyiv's navy, during its 2014 illegal annexation of the Crimean peninsula.

"Justice has been restored," the Ukrainian defense ministry wrote on social media.

For years, the Konstantin Olshansky was moored in southwestern Crimea's Sevastopol Bay as Russia dismantled it for parts, Ukrainian Navy spokesperson Dmytro Pletenchuk said on Tuesday. But Moscow eventually decided to restore the ship because it ran out of its own landing vessels.

Russia was planning to use the Konstantin Olshansky against Ukraine, Pletenchuk and Kyiv's defense ministry said.

Related stories

"Therefore, it was decided to hit this vessel with our Neptune," Pletenchuk said, according to the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper. "It was definitely damaged. In any case, it is not combat-ready now." 

The R-360 Neptune is a subsonic, long-range cruise missile designed by the Kyiv-based Luch Design Bureau. Ukraine has reportedly been working on an upgraded version of the munition, which has been used in the past to hit high-value Russian targets including the guided missile cruiser Moskva that was the Black Sea Fleet's flagship.

Ukraine on Sunday confirmed that it launched a huge missile attack on the port city of Sevastopol, home to the Black Sea Fleet, during the previous night, hitting two Ropucha-class landing ships, a naval communications center, and infrastructure facilities. Kyiv also revealed on Tuesday that it struck the Ivan Khurs reconnaissance ship, in addition to the Konstantin Olshansky.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's "continued illegal occupation of Ukraine is exacting a massive cost on Russia's Black Sea Fleet," UK Defense Minister Grant Shapps wrote on social media after the attack, calling the fleet "functionally inactive."

Indeed, Ukraine has compensated for its lack of a proper navy by using long-range cruise missiles — specifically, Western-provided Storm Shadow/SCALP-EG variants — and locally produced exploding naval drones to wreak havoc on the Black Sea Fleet.

Throughout the full-scale conflict, Ukraine has relied on this asymmetric style of warfare to take out roughly a third of the Black Sea Fleet, force some of Moscow's warships to relocate away from vulnerable Crimea and closer to mainland Russia, in the process opening up a maritime corridor for the grain exports crucial to its economy.

"I am grateful to all of our heroes who destroy enemy logistics in the occupied territories. Those who clear Crimea and the Black Sea of the occupiers' presence," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an address to the nation on Sunday.

"This is a difficult task, but our warriors are completing it step by step," he added. "Everyone sees it."

Watch: Video of Russian naval ship explosion shows a much-needed win for Ukraine

• Main content

Homes of Sean 'Diddy' Combs searched by federal officials, sources say

LOS ANGELES — Sean "Diddy" Combs is a subject of a federal investigation amid a wave of lawsuits that have been filed against the rap music mogul since November , a source familiar with the matter told NBC News on Monday.

Three women and a man have been interviewed by federal officials in Manhattan in relation to allegations of sex trafficking, sexual assault, and the solicitation and distribution of illegal narcotics and firearms, the source said. Interviews with three other subjects are also scheduled, the source said.

Four law enforcement sources told NBC News that federal agents with Homeland Security Investigations on Monday executed search warrants at Los Angeles and Miami properties belonging to Combs. The sources said the warrant is out of the Southern District of New York.

HSI confirmed in a statement that it "executed law enforcement actions" in New York as part of an ongoing investigation, along with teams in Los Angeles and Miami.

Homeland Security officials seized phones from Combs in Miami before he was scheduled to depart for a trip to the Bahamas, according to three law enforcement sources familiar with the warrant. Combs was in the Miami area when authorities executed the searches, sources said. It is not clear if Combs made the trip as planned.

Representatives for Combs, 54, did not immediately respond to NBC News’ request for comment Monday.

Series of allegations, lawsuits

News of a federal investigation comes after public scrutiny of Combs’ behavior after his former romantic partner, Cassie, accused him of physically and sexually abusing her for years. She made the allegations in a lawsuit filed late last year in New York under the New York Adult Survivors Act, which offered a one-year window for adult victims of sexual assault to come forward with civil claims regardless of the statute of limitations. 

Cassie, whose full name is Casandra Ventura, settled with Combs on Nov. 17, the day after the suit was filed on terms that have not been disclosed. 

Since then, three other women have come forward with lawsuits in the Southern District of New York alleging that they were sexually assaulted by Combs . Two of the women said they were teenagers at the time of the alleged assaults. 

Douglas Wigdor, who represents Ventura and a Jane Doe who filed suit, said in a statement that the searches and investigation were hopefully the beginning of a process that “will hold Mr. Combs responsible for his depraved conduct.” 

“We will always support law enforcement when it seeks to prosecute those that have violated the law,” Wigdor said.  

An attorney for Joi Dickerson-Neal, one of Combs' accusers, declined to comment to NBC News.

Combs has denied each of the sexual assault allegations, calling them “sickening.” 

A producer who worked for Combs between September 2022 and November 2023 filed a lawsuit in February alleging that Combs sexually harassed, drugged and threatened him for more than a year. The former employee, Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones, also alleged that he had video and audio evidence of Combs, his staff and others “engaging in serious illegal activity.”

Jones' attorney, Tyrone Blackburn, also represents Combs' accuser Liza Gardner. Blackburn said Monday that the federal investigation will not "prevent nor delay my clients’ pending and forthcoming actions for justice and resolution from the Combs RICO Enterprise.”

Shawn Holley, an attorney for Combs, previously denied Jones’ allegations and said that Combs’ team has “overwhelming, indisputable proof that his claims are complete lies.” 

One person who said he frequents the Los Angeles neighborhood where a search happened expressed shock.

Ryan Mendelsohn, 20, who used to live in the area and still regularly visits a nearby friend, told reporters he would see parties at the home and women outside. Other homes had parties, too, but that home had people there and women outside until 6 a.m., which was not usual, he said.

“I drive by a lot, and I see that — a lot of girls, maybe five or six girls outside, some leaving, some not, some going in,” adding he also saw Black Chevy Suburban SUVs there.

“I never thought anything of it,” said Mendelsohn, who said he did not know Combs lived there until Monday’s news coverage. “But now, it’s crazy.”

Weapons charge

Combs has had a number of legal issues in the past , but has rarely faced criminal charges. 

In 1999, Combs pleaded guilty to assaulting a record executive and was ordered to one day of anger management. That same year, Combs was accused of criminal possession of a weapon after a shooting at a New York nightclub. 

Witnesses told law enforcement that they saw Combs with a firearm at the club and that rapper Shyne, real name Moses Barrow fired into the crowd. Combs was pulled over by police in a vehicle with then-girlfriend Jennifer Lopez, and a gun was found in the car. Combs was acquitted of weapons and bribery charges, and Shyne was found guilty of the club shooting at trial. 

Since Ventura's suit and others have come forward accusing Combs of assault, the music mogul has been the center of scrutiny. He stepped down from his position as chairman of media network Revolt and Hulu pulled back from a planned reality series centered on his family. 

Diana Dasrath and Andrew Blankstein reported from Los Angeles, and Doha Madani and Jonathan Dienst from New York.

Diana Dasrath is entertainment producer and senior reporter for NBC News covering all platforms.

Doha Madani is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News. Pronouns: she/her.

Andrew Blankstein is an investigative reporter for NBC News. He covers the Western U.S., specializing in crime, courts and homeland security. 

Jonathan Dienst is chief justice contributor for NBC News and chief investigative reporter for WNBC-TV in New York.