Journalists Find 71-Metre Putin's Yacht In Turkey

It has already been used by Kabaeva.

Investigative centre "Dosier" claims to have found two superyachts allegedly used by Russian President Vladimir Putin and his entourage. They are the 71-metre Victoria and the 38-metre Orion that accompanies it. These vessels have not been known about before.

The yacht "Victoria" "Dosier" calls "the flagship of Vladimir Putin's Black Sea flotilla". It is claimed that the vessel is currently under repair in a dock in the Turkish port of Tuzla near Istanbul. Journalists of "Dosier" filmed the yacht from a quadrocopter.

According to a Dosier source who worked with Putin more than 20 years ago, the Victoria yacht was ordered by the Russian president to be built in the mid-2000s at the Sevmash military plant, along with the Graceful yacht, which has been previously reported - it was nominally owned by the company of Putin's friend Pyotr Kolbin and then sold to a company whose owners are classified. According to the Dossier, the construction of the Victoria yacht was ordered by the structures of businessman Sergei Maslov. The newspaper's interlocutors, however, claim that it was intended for Putin. In the end, the yacht was registered to the structures of another friend of Putin, Gennady Timchenko. The yacht was built for almost 14 years. Its cost is estimated at $50 million.

The crew of the vessel, according to "Dossier", includes people who worked on other yachts, allegedly connected with Putin and his entourage. The Victoria is based in Sochi and periodically goes as far as Cape Idokopas, where the so-called Putin palace, best known due to the FBK investigation, is located. In the summer of 2021, the yacht reached annexed Crimea, on this voyage it was accompanied by the Italian-built yacht Orion.

"Dossier" claims that the yacht "Victoria" was used by Alina Kabaeva, who has been described in numerous investigations as close to Vladimir Putin. Following the arrest of the yacht "Scheherazade" in Italy, "Victoria" is now the largest yacht in the Black Sea linked to Putin, the investigation claims. The Black Sea "flotilla" also includes Chaika, which is on the balance sheet of the Presidential Affairs Directorate, Shellest, owned by an organisation linked to Putin's friend Yuri Kovalchuk, and Orion. There is also a similar "flotilla" of three yachts in the Baltic Sea, the largest of which is "Graceful".

"Dossier" admits that there is "no direct documentary evidence" that the "Victoria" is linked to Putin. But it is claimed that there is "a lot of indirect evidence: a specially selected crew, the ship's route near the palace of the head of state, the formal owner, and the unusual history of construction".