With jacuzzis, an on-board cinema, sumptuous dining rooms, big dance floors and, of course, the obligatory helipad: The superyacht is the ultimate status symbol for every oligarch. With Russian billionaires' penchant for decadent luxury, the manufacturers of these floating palaces make tidy sums.
The purchase price of the two most-expensive pleasure ships owned by Russian oligarchs — Roman Abramovich's "Eclipse" and Alischer Usmanov's "Dilbar" — is estimated at around $1.5 billion (€1.3 billion) alone. These boats, luxury "made in Germany," were built at the traditional shipyards in Hamburg and Bremen.
As long ago as 2014, after the annexation of Crimea by Russia, questions were raised in the German and European press about whether democratic Europe was not accepting such questionable billions from Russia too lightly. Similar concerns were raised after the poisoning of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. But nothing happened.
Wealthy Russians with Kremlin ties
For two decades now, rich Russians have been investing heavily in luxury real estate in western Europe and shopping in the most expensive boutiques in Paris, Milan or Rome. They like to enjoy their wealth here, in the West. Not in Norilsk or in the Chukchi Autonomous Okrug far in the northeast of Russia, where precious metals, oil, and gas are mined to their benefit by ordinary Russians under the worst conditions.
The nouveau riche Russians send their children to expensive elite schools in Western countries, including Germany. And yet they despise the European ideal of a free, democratic society. Instead, they support the kleptocratic regime of a dictator who is becoming ever more aggressive in his revisionist desires.
That there is no access to the country's raw materials in Russia without loyalty to the Kremlin has been clear at least since the imprisonment and expropriation of former oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky almost 20 years ago.
Absolute loyalty is rewarded with production licenses, large state contracts and subsidies. In the privatization of large industrial enterprises and the distribution of the most important posts in the (in part only formally) state-owned commodity corporations, no one from Putin's most devoted oligarch guard was left out.
Sanctions alone are not enough
They rake in billions and are decorated with medals. And they support every annexation of sovereign regions; they accept every state-ordered murder by the regime, every underhanded poisoning of regime critics. And now, they support the bloody war of aggression against Ukraine, the first in Europe of this scale since that unleashed by Adolf Hitler.
The blood of the Ukrainians is now also on their hands. Their money is blood money. But few of them are on the European Union's sanctions list at this point.
Even once on the sanctions list, measures will be difficult to enforce. That includes sanctions against Vladimir Putin, who has now been targeted personally. The Russian kleptocrats, the cynical profiteers of the regime and probably also the dictator himself, have perfected the art of concealment during their decades in power.
Louis XIV aspirations
The "Palace of Putin" in the southern Russian city of Gelendzhik, which was uncovered and publicized by the now-imprisoned regime critic Alexei Navalny, displays absolutist pretensions not unlike those of France's infamous Sun King, Louis XIV.
On paper, it belongs neither to the monarch himself nor the state, rather to inconspicuous companies, through the accounts of which billions flow into the magnificent building. But in a roundabout way: From accounts belonging to a network of companies owned by people who owe their wealth solely to the ruler in the Kremlin.
The billion-dollar company holdings of cellist and childhood friend of Putin, Sergei Roldugin — which were revealed in the course of the Panama Papers — are another prime example of the Russian art of obfuscation. The dictator himself, his friends, and the oligarchs are all practiced in remaining absolutely anonymous with the help of shell companies and straw men. This would apply, if necessary, to circumventing sanctions.
No more oligarch luxury in Western Europe
In response to Putin's war against Ukraine, but also to protect democracy in Germany and on the continent, Europe must finally renounce the sweet poison of big money from Kremlin crony billionaires. Every single one of them belongs on the EU sanctions list.
What's more, in order to identify questionable Russian money from all of the Kremlin ruler's henchmen, Germany must massively strengthen its hitherto neglected financial intelligence unit.
Apart from all the necessary political measures, it is crucial that not only Putin but also his oligarchs are ostracized in the West. Decency alone demands that we refrain from doing business that enables the accomplices of a bloody dictator to live their luxurious lives. A start would be to stop maintaining or repairing Russians' luxury yachts in Germany, similar to what has already happened in civil aviation with the latest sanctions.
If we are already punishing ordinary air travelers from Russia, why are we sparing Putin's henchmen?
This opinion piece was originally written in German.