Former Putin-appointed governor in Crimea found guilty of breaching UK sanctions
Dmitrii Ovsiannikov – who was appointed governor of Sevastopol in July 2016, two years after Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine – was charged with trying to circumvent sanctions between February 2023 and January 2024.
Ovsiannikov was found guilty of six counts of circumventing sanctions and two counts of possessing or using criminal property. The jury was unable to reach a verdict on a seventh charge of circumventing sanctions.
The 48-year-old, who had denied all the charges, will be sentenced at London's Southwark Crown Court on Friday.
Ovsiannikov had been accused of getting his wife Ekaterina Ovsiannikova, 47, to pay 76,000 pounds ($97,000) into his account, some of which was so he could buy a Mercedes-Benz SUV.
Prosecutors said Ovsiannikov then got his 47-year-old brother Alexei Owsjanikow to buy the car and insurance for it, before Owsjanikow later paid just over 41,000 pounds for his brother's children's private school fees.
Owsjanikow and Ovsiannikova faced five and four counts of circumventing sanctions respectively, which they denied.
The jury found Owsjanikow guilty of two counts of circumventing sanctions, in relation to the school fees, but he was acquitted in relation to the car and insurance.
Ovsiannikova was cleared of all charges.
When Ovsiannikov was charged last year, the National Crime Agency said he was the first person to be charged in Britain with breaching sanctions relating to Russia.
($1 = 0.7837 pounds)
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Wall Street Journal
27 minutes ago
- Wall Street Journal
Putin Returns to Moscow With Air of Triumph After Summit
ANCHORAGE, Alaska—Russian President Vladimir Putin couldn't have scripted his first visit to the U.S. since 2015 much better. The Russian leader strutted along a red carpet at a U.S. air base and posed smiling with President Trump, who had weeks earlier been expressing mounting frustration with him and threatening to hit Russia and its trading partners with sanctions. He met with Trump under a sign that read 'pursuing peace.'
Washington Post
27 minutes ago
- Washington Post
Trump's rush for Ukraine peace deal may leave details up to Putin
ANCHORAGE — President Donald Trump arrived at his historic summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in this breezy Alaskan city with a clarion goal in mind: a halt to years of bloody fighting in Ukraine. Ideally within days.
San Francisco Chronicle
an hour ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
In letter to Putin, US first lady asks him to consider the children in push to end war in Ukraine
WASHINGTON (AP) — Melania Trump took the unique step of crafting a letter that calls for peace in Ukraine, having her husband President Donald Trump hand-deliver it to Russian President Vladimir Putin during their Friday meeting in Alaska. The letter did not specifically name Ukraine, which Putin's forces invaded in 2022, but beseeched him to think of children and 'an innocence which stands above geography, government, and ideology.' Nor did the American first lady discuss the fighting other than to say to Putin that he could 'singlehandedly restore' the 'melodic laughter' of children who have been caught in the conflict. 'In protecting the innocence of these children, you will do more than serve Russia alone — you serve humanity itself,' she wrote on White House stationery. The first lady said that Putin could help these children with the stroke of a pen. Putin's invasion of Ukraine has resulted in Russia taking Ukrainian children out of their country so that they can be raised as Russian. The Associated Press documented the grabbing of Ukrainian children in 2022, after which the International Criminal Court said it had issued an arrest warrant for Putin for war crimes, accusing him of personal responsibility for the abductions of children from Ukraine.
