Maybe just the former ? Not impossible but unlikely . What is the alternative though? They refuse to play because the club can’t fly them there cheaply enough ?
I believe this is being discussed fully in the Premier League Thread https://www.not606.com/threads/the-premier-league-thread.331797/page-1506#post-15684878
Whilst it is a shock for Chelsea and football in general, it pales into insignificance with innocent people losing their homes, jobs, freedoms and lives really.
Totally agree, shouldnt really be discussed in here, and has shocked me that this is important to be discussed in this thread.
I guess the main politics angle (for the purpose of this thread) is why this took longer to happen than the others Might be they thought a quick sale was possible but that really doesn’t seem likely given the size of the club - and the apparent desire to not allow him to keep the proceeds Timing is very strange
It is strange timing, but I think the delay on sanctions was because he owned Chelsea. If he didn't he would have been sanctioned immediately IMO. There are legal issues with sanctions and that is why the government have dragged their feet - we luckily live in a society where the government need good reason (not saying they haven't btw) to seize your assets and due diligence needed to be done.
Correct, we need proof of where funds/assets etc came from i imagine, and that is not an overnight process. Perhaps it could have been done sooner, it did feel a little like helping some rich folk get their houses (pun intended) in order. But we do have to follow the legal pieces on this, perhaps other countries have a different approach???
I’m sure it gets even more complicated when it comes to people who aren’t citizens and don’t have visas But you’d expect they would have had most of the info they needed given they have already blocked his visa before. Also it’s something you would think you would investigate back when the crimea thing happened And Roman’s sanctions have come later than others. As mentioned likely due to owning a high profile football club I imagine they will consider what they can do when a new licence is needed from June. Whether they can allow more things if the final destination of the funds is controlled for example.
It does, but it’s still quite scary that there is now a precedent set for the government to just take people’s property without much process. I wonder if this will have severe long term negative consequences here as well as just for the oligarchs.
I’m not sure we know that there hasn’t been some kind of process. But like you say - maybe not much of them And they have been frozen not “taken”. Which, I appreciate, to the average person on the street will be the same thing if applied to them
Not wishing to stir the pot here but given our current government that really can’t be taken at face value. Which I assume is what Ossie was getting at
The problem I have is that all of society is built on the principles of property rights. By confiscating his assets now, we are confiscating them purely because he’s Russian - which is quite barmy to be honest. As I see it if they have investigated and found reasons for the confiscations, they should have investigated his assets many years ago and stopped his ability to operate in the UK when it began… Obviously if seizing the oligarchs assets helps to slow Putin you can say it’s for the greater good - but it’s still a bad precedent that they can just pick a list of people and freeze their stuff.
Thing is we can’t have it both ways. We cry out why hasn’t he been sanctioned and now worry he has. Also assets not seized but frozen. A big difference. His assets in the UK have been accumulated using dirty money and he is backing Putin. Again I take it at face value and don’t see it as a wider plan by the government.
I have just seen an interview where a Russian has said - you can only be a billionaire oligarch in Russia if Putin allows you to be. So links to the dirty money and connections point Now could they all join together to topple him? Maybe. But who would go first ? Similar to why no prosecutor is laying criminal charges against Trump. But with far more at stake
This applies to all Russian institutions and individuals sanctioned. The EU has had procedures in place over and above the UK which go back to 2014. https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/policies/sanctions/restrictive-measures-ukraine-crisis/
Beyond the whole "likely to start a nuclear war" thing, a no-fly zone is pretty dumb given that right now one of Ukraine's greatest assets is its drones, either used to fire missiles or used for aerial reconnaissance. Russia is still just sending convoys with little screening and seemingly no air defense (and when there is air defense, it's not turned on; drones shouldn't be blowing up air defense vehicles, yet it keeps happening), which leads to stuff like this: Absent planes, Russia would still be able to lob artillery and missiles at Ukraine. Absent drones, Ukraine would have a far more difficult time targeting convoys and supplies.
and they’ve all been completely ignored until now. Apparently some large companies in Nigeria are unable to get hold of dollars to pay their debts in due to Russian bank sanctions. Wonder what other weird side effects we are going to see from all of this
