Russian court orders seizure of hotel from Putin-critic oligarch

A Russian court has ordered the seizure of a luxury hotel complex owned by billionaire Oleg Deripaska, one of the few oligarchs to have criticised President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine, in a sign of the pressure facing the country’s tycoons since the invasion.

The legal dispute, following an initial claim brought by a science and educational hub under Putin’s patronage, predates the invasion and is not ostensibly linked to Deripaska’s guarded criticism of the war, which he has called “madness”.

But the court order to seize the $1bn Imeretinskiy hotel complex and marina in Sochi came after the Kremlin asked Deripaska to stop criticising the war, according to two people familiar with the matter.

“The Kremlin asked him to calm down,” said one person close to Deripaska.

[It could be worse. Deripaska could have fallen victim to the Moscow Window Flu. And if he keeps up the criticism, he just might. — Ed]