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Britain expanded its sanctions regime against Russian President Vladimir Putin's cronies on Thursday, hitting seven more oligarchs over their links to the leader.
Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich was the most high-profile name on the list, as the UK government imposed asset freezes and a travel ban on the billionaire.
Others targeted in retaliation for Russia's invasion of Ukraine included leading industrialist Oleg Deripaska, Rosneft chief executive Igor Sechin and the head of Gazprom Alexei Miller.
Collectively, the seven have a net worth of about £15 billion, the Conservative-led government said.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson called the sanctions "the latest step in the UK's unwavering support for the Ukrainian people".
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said: "Today's sanctions show once again that oligarchs and kleptocrats have no place in our economy or society.
"With their close links to Putin they are complicit in his aggression. The blood of the Ukrainian people is on their hands. They should hang their heads in shame."
The seven oligarchs
Roman Abramovich, 55. The government has for weeks resisted calls to sanction Mr Abramovich over his perceived close ties to the Kremlin. It is believed ministers were trying to build a strong case against him before imposing curbs on his freedom of movement and financial assets.
The Russian-Israeli made his fortune in the post-Soviet years and was close to former Russian president Boris Yeltsin. He has always staunchly denied any current political links to Russia’s ruling elite.
He is the largest stakeholder in London-listed Russian-focused mining company Evraz, with an ownership of 29 per cent.
Mr Abramovich bought Chelsea FC in 2003 and bankrolled its successes at domestic and European levels.
After Russia invaded Ukraine, the tycoon announced he was stepping back from the day-to-day running of the club. A week later he said he was selling Chelsea and would donate the "net proceeds" to help Ukrainian war victims.
The sale of the club is on hold in light of the sanctions.
Jets and yachts owned or chartered by Mr Abramovich can been seized under the sanctions.
The UK government estimated his net worth at £9.4 billion (€11.1 billion, $12.2 billion), but said it was mitigating the effect of the sanctions on Chelsea by allowing the club to continue to operate.
Mr Abramovich received financial benefits from the Kremlin, including tax breaks for his companies, the buying and selling of shares from and to the state at favourable rates, and contacts in the run up to the 2018 World Cup in Russia, ministers claimed.
The government described Mr Abramovich as “a prominent Russian businessman and pro-Kremlin oligarch” who is “associated with a person who is or has been involved in destabilising Ukraine and undermining and threatening the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine” – namely President Putin.
Indeed the men are described as having had “a close relationship for decades”, an association which has resulted in “financial or other material benefit” from the Russian regime, the government said.
A special licence "authorises a number of football-related activities", the government said.
"This includes permissions for the club to continue playing matches and other football-related activity which will in turn protect the Premier League, the wider football pyramid, loyal fans and other clubs," it said.
Oleg Deripaska, 54. The industrialist is worth £2 billion and has had close links with the British political establishment. He has a multi-million pound property portfolio in the UK.
He is Mr Abramovich's one-time business partner and has stakes in En+ Group, an Anglo-Russian green energy and metals company.
He was caught up in controversy in 2008 when, alongside financier Nathaniel Rothcschild, he hosted future chancellor of the exchequor George Osbourne and Labour minister Peter Mandelson on a yacht in Corfu.
The government said Mr Deripaska is “a prominent Russian businessman and pro-Kremlin oligarch”, who is “closely associated” with both the Russian government and its president. As with Mr Abramovich, it said Mr Deripaska is “involved in destabilising and threatening” Ukraine.
It said he “has been involved in obtaining benefit from or supporting the government of Russia, by carrying on business in, and owning or controlling and working as a director or equivalent in businesses in the Russian extractives and energy sectors” particularly useful to the Kremlin.
Igor Sechin, 61. Officials described Mr Sechin as Russian President Vladimir Putin's "right-hand man" and the second most important person in the country.
He is chief executive of Rosneft, the state-owned oil company.
French customs last week seized a yacht linked to Mr Sechin.
Andrey Kostin, 65. The chairman of VTB, a Russian state-owned bank.
Mr Kostin is also a member of the supreme council of the United Russia political party and deemed a “close associate” of Mr Putin who has “long supported” the Kremlin.
He has a net worth of an estimated £379 million, and has previously been sanctioned by the US and the EU.
Alexei Miller, 60. The CEO of energy company Gazprom, Russia's largest company and the world' biggest public energy supplier.
He is a former deputy minister of energy and in 2005 was named "Person of the Year" by Expert, a Russian business magazine.
Mr Miller to be “one of the most important executives” backing the Kremlin. The British government has described him as a “prominent Russian businessman with close personal ties to Vladimir Putin”. It also cited Gazprom’s role in supplying gas to Crimea – illegally annexed by Russia in 2014 – as being financially involved with the Kremlin.
Nikolai Tokarev, 71: The president of the Russia state-owned pipeline company Transneft.
Mr Tokarev is a former KGB officer who served alongside Mr Putin in East Germany towards the end of the Cold War. It is claimed the pair have remained closely associated ever since.
Mr Tokarev worked under Mr Putin at the presidential property management department during the Nineties.
Dmitri Lebedev, 53. The businessman and financier serves as the chairman of the Board of Directors of Bank Rossiya, a Russian joint stock bank.
Mr Lebedev’s involvement in the financial sector is deemed to be of strategic significance to the Russian government. British ministers cited Bank Rossiya’s opening of branches across Crimea since it was annexed from Ukraine in 2014 as key to their decision to add him to the sanctions list.
It also highlighted Sogaz’s role in insuring the construction of the bridge over the Kerch Strait between the Russian mainland and the Crimean peninsula, thus supporting the internationally condemned annexation.
The latest expansion of sanctions came a week after Mr Johnson's previous extension of punitive measures against Russian businesses, when five more Russian oligarchs were added to a wider list of targets.
Among them was a billionaire once married to the daughter of Mr Putin, and major financial figures.
"They come to Harrods to shop, they stay in our best hotels when they like, they send their children to our best public schools, and that is what's being stopped," a diplomatic source said.
"So that these people are essentially persona non grata in every major western European capital in the world. That really bites."
The five oligarchs previously named are:
Kirill Shamalov, 39. He is Russia's youngest billionaire and the former husband of Mr Putin's daughter Katerina Tikhonova.
Pyotr Fradkov, 43. He is head of the sanctioned Promsvyazbank, which finances Russian defence industries, and the son of Mikhail Fradkov, a former prime minister of Russia who was chief of its foreign intelligence service.
Denis Bortnikov, 47. The deputy president of government-affiliated VTB bank. His father, Alexander Bortnikov, is head of the Federal Security Service .
Yury Slyusar, 47. The director of United Aircraft Corporation, one of the major defence organisations that has also had sanctions imposed.
Elena Georgieva, 45. The chairwoman of the board of Novikombank, a state-owned defence conglomerate that finances Rostec.
The wider sanctions package include:
- Impose asset freezes on all major Russian banks, including immediately against VTB, the second largest bank, with assets totalling £154 billion ($206bn)
- Banning all major Russian companies from raising finance on UK markets and the Russian state from raising sovereign debt on the UK markets
- Individual sanctions against more than 100 people, entities and subsidiaries including Rostec, Russia's biggest defence company said to employ more than two million people, with exports of more than £10bn of arms each year
UK’s AI plan
- AI ambassadors such as MIT economist Simon Johnson, Monzo cofounder Tom Blomfield and Google DeepMind’s Raia Hadsell
- £10bn AI growth zone in South Wales to create 5,000 jobs
- £100m of government support for startups building AI hardware products
- £250m to train new AI models
Classification of skills
A worker is categorised as skilled by the MOHRE based on nine levels given in the International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) issued by the International Labour Organisation.
A skilled worker would be someone at a professional level (levels 1 – 5) which includes managers, professionals, technicians and associate professionals, clerical support workers, and service and sales workers.
The worker must also have an attested educational certificate higher than secondary or an equivalent certification, and earn a monthly salary of at least Dh4,000.
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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10 tips for entry-level job seekers
- Have an up-to-date, professional LinkedIn profile. If you don’t have a LinkedIn account, set one up today. Avoid poor-quality profile pictures with distracting backgrounds. Include a professional summary and begin to grow your network.
- Keep track of the job trends in your sector through the news. Apply for job alerts at your dream organisations and the types of jobs you want – LinkedIn uses AI to share similar relevant jobs based on your selections.
- Double check that you’ve highlighted relevant skills on your resume and LinkedIn profile.
- For most entry-level jobs, your resume will first be filtered by an applicant tracking system for keywords. Look closely at the description of the job you are applying for and mirror the language as much as possible (while being honest and accurate about your skills and experience).
- Keep your CV professional and in a simple format – make sure you tailor your cover letter and application to the company and role.
- Go online and look for details on job specifications for your target position. Make a list of skills required and set yourself some learning goals to tick off all the necessary skills one by one.
- Don’t be afraid to reach outside your immediate friends and family to other acquaintances and let them know you are looking for new opportunities.
- Make sure you’ve set your LinkedIn profile to signal that you are “open to opportunities”. Also be sure to use LinkedIn to search for people who are still actively hiring by searching for those that have the headline “I’m hiring” or “We’re hiring” in their profile.
- Prepare for online interviews using mock interview tools. Even before landing interviews, it can be useful to start practising.
- Be professional and patient. Always be professional with whoever you are interacting with throughout your search process, this will be remembered. You need to be patient, dedicated and not give up on your search. Candidates need to make sure they are following up appropriately for roles they have applied.
Arda Atalay, head of Mena private sector at LinkedIn Talent Solutions, Rudy Bier, managing partner of Kinetic Business Solutions and Ben Kinerman Daltrey, co-founder of KinFitz
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Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
The language of diplomacy in 1853
Treaty of Peace in Perpetuity Agreed Upon by the Chiefs of the Arabian Coast on Behalf of Themselves, Their Heirs and Successors Under the Mediation of the Resident of the Persian Gulf, 1853
(This treaty gave the region the name “Trucial States”.)
We, whose seals are hereunto affixed, Sheikh Sultan bin Suggar, Chief of Rassool-Kheimah, Sheikh Saeed bin Tahnoon, Chief of Aboo Dhebbee, Sheikh Saeed bin Buyte, Chief of Debay, Sheikh Hamid bin Rashed, Chief of Ejman, Sheikh Abdoola bin Rashed, Chief of Umm-ool-Keiweyn, having experienced for a series of years the benefits and advantages resulting from a maritime truce contracted amongst ourselves under the mediation of the Resident in the Persian Gulf and renewed from time to time up to the present period, and being fully impressed, therefore, with a sense of evil consequence formerly arising, from the prosecution of our feuds at sea, whereby our subjects and dependants were prevented from carrying on the pearl fishery in security, and were exposed to interruption and molestation when passing on their lawful occasions, accordingly, we, as aforesaid have determined, for ourselves, our heirs and successors, to conclude together a lasting and inviolable peace from this time forth in perpetuity.
Taken from Britain and Saudi Arabia, 1925-1939: the Imperial Oasis, by Clive Leatherdale
Tuesday's fixtures
Kyrgyzstan v Qatar, 5.45pm
