The UK has sanctioned the “step-daughter” of the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov in its latest raft of economic measures against those with close ties to the Kremlin.
The British government targeted Polina Kovaleva and 64 other individuals and companies on Thursday to put more pressure on Russia to end its war in Ukraine.
The 26-year-old, who is thought to have worked for the Russian energy giant Gazprom after gaining degrees from two British universities, lives in a multi-million pound home in London.
Her sanctioning comes soon after supporters of Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny named her mother as Mr Lavrov’s alleged long-time lover, querying how Ms Kovaleva had the means to fund such a lavish lifestyle.
After Russia invaded Ukraine in late February, demonstrators protested outside her flat calling her the “daughter of a war criminal”.
As well as sanctioning other people such the billionaire oil tycoon Eugene Shvidler, the British government took action on Thursday against companies supporting the war in Ukraine, including the drone manufacturer Kronshtadt.
The Russian paramilitary group Wagner and Alrosa, the world’s biggest diamond manufacturer, were also hit with sanctions.
Speaking about his government’s latest wave of measures, Boris Johnson said: “Vladimir Putin is plainly determined to double down on his path of violence and aggression, absolutely brutal the way he’s treating the Ukrainian people.”
“We’ve got to step up, we’ve got to increase our support, we’ve got to tighten the economic vice around Putin, sanctioning more people today,” he added.
Meanwhile, foreign secretary Liz Truss said it was right that those who are “complicit” with Russian crimes in Ukraine should “pay the price”.
Joe Powell, the co-founder of the Kensington Against Dirty Money initiative, welcomed the freezing of Ms Kovaleva’s assets.
“The government must now ensure that financial trickery is not used to evade these sanctions, for example by placing properties in the names of anonymous trusts,” he said.
The comment follows oligarch Alisher Usmanov’s suggestion earlier this week that he had evaded British sanctions by transferring his British mansions into trusts in his relatives’ names.
