Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation reveals Putin’s second Black Sea palace in annexed Crimea

An investigation carried out by Russia’s Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) has revealed that a palace in Russian-annexed Crimea once belonging to former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych is now being used as personal property by Vladimir Putin.

The complex of buildings, located on Cape Aya, near the peninsula’s largest city Sevastopol, was formally transferred to state ownership alongside Yanukovych’s other property in Crimea after he fled to Russia following months of protests against his rule in 2014, according to the FBK investigation.

According to the FBK, which was founded by the late Russian opposition politician Alexey Navalny, the palace was actually transferred to Yury and Mikhail Kovalchuk, two close friends of Putin who are both oligarchs, for use by Putin himself.

The buildings, which cover an area of over 9,000 square metres, were rebuilt using money from the state budget and offshore funds, at an estimated cost of at least 10 billion rubles (€108.3 million), according to the investigation. This was exactly the same way Putin financed his better-known Black Sea palace in Gelendzhik, which was the subject of the FBK’s most viewed investigative report in 2021.

Referring to internal documents and a brochure, the FBK said the main house was “ringed by a frieze depicting the main milestones in the history of the development of Crimea”, and that the complex included a “home hospital”, a doctor’s surgery with an ultrasound machine and various other medical and diagnostic equipment, as well as an operating theatre, a cryo-chamber and a spa.

The revelation of Putin’s second Black Sea palace came a day after the Russian authorities accused Kyiv, without providing any evidence, of launching a drone strike on another Putin residence in Valdai, in northern Russia. That claim was dismissed by Kyiv however, which called it an attempt by Moscow to disrupt the ongoing US-led peace negotiations to bring the war in Ukraine to an end.