Putin's ex wife mulls selling her luxury villas in Spain over EU sanction fears

Former wife of Russia's President, Vladimir Putin, Lyudmila Ocheretnaya who married Ironman triathlon amateur and businessman Artur Ocheretny in 2015 is "urgently" selling her real estate properties in Spain over fears of Western sanctions in response to her ex-husband Putin's invasion of neighbouring Ukraine.

The 65-year-old, who divorced Putin in 2013, owns two apartments in Marbella, the resort city located in southern Spain’s Costa del Sol worth 2.2 million euros or approximately Rs 19 crores. Ocheretnaya also owns a luxury flat in Switzerland, Davos worth 3.7 million euros or Rs 32 crores, and a villa on the French Atlantic coast in Anglet, near Biarritz. Thus far, Putin's ex-wife has been able to bypass the sanctions as all her properties are registered under her husband's name who stole the limelight for being at least 21 years younger than Ocheretnaya at the time of their marriage. Putin's former wife is speculated to have dozens of luxurious properties and hr lifestyle is deemed to be in the likeness of Russian oligarchs. 

Putin's ex-wife selling two apartments in luxury residential complex Lomas del Rey 

Known formerly as Lyudmila Putina, Russia's President's ex-life partner fears that her villas will fall under the EU sanctions and is now selling off at least two apartments in the luxury residential complex Lomas del Rey of Marbella in southern Spain, Spanish newspaper El Mundo is reporting. Another prominent Spain-based publication Español reported that Ocheretnaya bought the luxury apartments in 'Golden Mile' in 2011 and in 2014, shortly before she tied the knot with Ocheretny. Her 229 and 405 square meters apartments are the "most expensive" properties in all of the Mediterranean.

The purchase was made via a mortgage loan approved by a Spanish bank. It is believed that Putin's ex-wife, who was appointed as the head of the Center for the Development of Interpersonal Communication in Moscow three years before she called off her marriage with Putin, did not have sufficient funds to buy the flats. It is understood that Lyudmila Ocheretnaya and her current husband will soon be on Brittain's sanctions list as Russia's jailed opposition leader and Putin's staunch critic Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation has been pushing for blacklisting her.

Navalny's anti-corruption foundation FBK is arguing that "the value of the real estate acquired by the Ocherentykhs far exceeds the family's legal income" and that these investments' origin is "unclear." Meanwhile, a separate investigative report published by the American newspaper Politico stated that the couple "is not on the European Union’s sanctions list, but that could quickly change; after all, London has already put Ocheretnaya and her adult children [from her marriage to Putin - Ed.] under sanctions. If Brussels followed suit, it could put the apartment and the rest of their European portfolio suddenly out of reach."

According to the Dutch paper VRT, Putin, on numerous occasions, had asked to keep her ex-wife out of politics. "My wife is not a public person,” Putin was quoted as saying in his 2012 speech. The UK has already placed Putin's rumoured girlfriend Alina Kabayeva (39) on the sanctions list. 

 “We are now once again tightening the grip on his inner circle, and will continue to do so until Ukraine is victorious," the British government had noted in a statement published by Downing Street at the time.