Secret documents showed Putin moved his superyacht before invasion

In August 2023, secret emails sent to a German shipyard were released to the public by an anti-corruption group and revealed that a yacht believed to be owned by Vladimir Putin was ordered to leave its mooring just three weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine.

Known as the Graceful, and also by its codename Kosatka which means Killer Whale, the $100 million superyacht had been sent to Hamburg’s Blohm + Voss shipyard to undergo a 32 million dollar refit according to The Guardian.

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The refit was supposed to be completed on February 1st, 2022, but one secret email showed that on January 19th the Graceful was ordered to set sail out of the German shipyard before the refit of the ship had been completed.

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The Graceful was meant to leave German waters on February 1st and it was to make its way to the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. The excuse given in the email for the ship's departure from the shipyard was that its owner wasn't happy with the refit.

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“The owner is not happy with the retrofit,” one secret email read according to a translation from The Independent. “He is dissatisfied with the delays in the construction process.” 

“The owner wants the Graceful to be brought to the Russian Federation on February 1st … Please mobilize an uninterrupted crew – 2 shifts,” the email to the shipyard added.

Photo Credit: YouTube @NavalnyRu

The secret emails were released by Russian investigative journalist Maria Pevchikh. Pevchikh heads an anti-corruption foundation that was established by Alexei Navalny, a Russian lawyer and opposition leader who is currently in prison after challenging Putin.

The email in question appeared to come from an employee of Russia’s largest shipping company, the SCF Group, according to the images that were provided by Pevchikh and her team. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By kremlin.ru website team

The email stressed that the Graceful needed to sail out of the Blohm & Voss shipyard by February 1st and that the ship's owner wanted all of the associated costs calculated to ensure that the vessel would be able to leave port on schedule. 

Photo Credit: YouTube @NavalnyRu

“Please calculate the amount to be paid by Owners due to early departure. Crew and myself will provide full assistance to prepare Graceful for Towing,” the email explained. 

The Guardian reported images showed the Graceful leaving the Blohm & Voss shipyard on February 7th, just fifteen days before Putin ordered his full-scale invasion of Ukraine. 

“Half of the country is forced to raise money for underwear and socks for mobilized soldiers, and to make trench candles, while the person who unleashed this war spends 3bn roubles just on repairs and purchases for his yacht,” Pevchikh report read. 

Business Insider reported that previous images taken from inside the Graceful showed that the ship's interior contained marble bathrooms and rooms with carpets upwards of $88,000 dollars. 

The superyacht's pool could also be converted into a dancefloor and it was believed to have an elaborate marble dinner room that could seat up to twelve people as well as a sauna and bedrooms that contained beds worth $34,000.

Photo Credit: YouTube @NavalnyRu

The U.S. The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) lists the Graceful as a "blocked property" that is of interest to Putin due to the vessel's links to the Russian President. 

Alongside the Graceful, Putin allegedly owns a superyacht called the Olympia, which is also on the OFAC’s list of blocked properties, as well as the $700 million Scheherazade, which was impounded in Italy while undergoing repairs according to The Guardian. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By DrDuu 007 - Own Work, CC BY-SA 4.0