Luxury properties occupied by activists

A house in London belonging to the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska on the British sanctions list was occupied by people who called themselves anarchists and put up a Ukrainian flag and a banner with the message “This property was released, “according to the BBC and Reuters.

Activists seized the mansion of Oleg Deripaska. pic.twitter.com/AZKCmsWCsX

— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) March 14, 2022

Anarchist Action Network reported that those who entered the building were members of the organization, who used the gesture in protest of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and to show “solidarity” with the Ukrainian people and Russian citizens. they never agreed to this madness. ” “You are occupying Ukraine, we are occupying you,” the organization said in a statement.

The organization says the property will serve as “support for refugees, for people in Ukraine and for people of all nations and ethnicities.” Some of the protesters told reporters that there was no hot water in the house and no food in the refrigerators, suggesting that the property had not been inhabited for some time, according to the BBC.

They say they do not intend to live or sleep in the building, but will occupy it by rotation.

According to a court document from 2007, Oleg Deripaska is listed as the owner of the Belgrave Square property. A judge of this court said a year earlier that this property and another house owned by the Russian billionaire outside London were then worth about 40 million pounds.

Biarritz villa of Putin’s ex son-in-law also occupied

Two activists forced their way in and occupied a luxury villa in Biarritz, southwestern France, owned by Vladimir Putin’s former son-in-law. The two say they have changed the locks and will make the property available to Ukrainian refugees.

Pierre Haffner of the Svoboda Liberté Association and Sergey Saveliev entered the eight-bedroom house in Biarritz, which is very popular with Russian oligarchs. They announced on social media that they have changed the locks of the villa and that it will be open only to Ukrainian refugees fleeing the war, The Guardian reported.

According to the same source, the property belongs to Kirill Shamalov, a Russian billionaire who was married to Putin’s youngest daughter, Katerina Tikhonova.

Haffner and Saveliev also said they found one of Shamalov’s passports and a translation of a Moscow electricity bill. A photo posted on a social network shows one of the activists on a balcony of the house waving a Ukrainian flag.

Haffner, who said he was renaming the property “Villa Ukraine”, said he would ask human rights activists and lawyers to ask the Biarritz City Hall and police for permission to use the villa to house Ukrainian refugees.