(RoyalPatriot.com )- The UK Daily Mail is obsessed with the so-called “superyacht” that allegedly belongs to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Last week, the tabloid outlet reported that the luxurious Scheherazade, believed to have been used by Putin’s girlfriend, was a gift to Putin from a group of wealthy Russian oligarchs.
The Daily Mail claimed the yacht was purchased in 2014 for about 583 million euros by a group of Russian billionaires headed by a close Putin ally, Gennady Timchenko.
Officially, the owner of the superyacht is Eduard Khudainatov, the former president of Rosneft who is an old KGB ally of Igor Sechin.
But Russian opposition news outlet Dossier Centre claims that Khudainatov is merely the frontman and Vladimir Putin is the yacht’s true owner.
The construction of the superyacht was made possible by a transfer of just over 583 million euros from five offshore companies in December 2014. The theory is the billionaire oligarchs paid to have the yacht constructed as a New Year’s gift to the Russian president.
Putin’s supposed superyacht made headlines shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine and the West began placing sanctions on Russian oligarchs.
The 459-foot yacht is believed to be one of the most expensive in the world.
In early March, when the yacht was moored at the Italian Sea Group shipyard in Marina di Carrara, Italian authorities asked the yacht’s British captain, Guy Thomas Bennett-Pearce to turn over certification documents and paperwork.
Bennett-Pearce complied. However, he denied the yacht was owned by Putin.
Bennet-Pearce had told the New York Times at the time that he had never met Vladimir Putin, nor had the Russian president ever stepped foot aboard the vessel.
The super-yacht, estimated to be worth approximately $700 million, has been called a floating city. It features marble and gold surfaces, a spa, a sauna, a theater, two helipads, a gym, and a ballroom with a tile dance floor that can shift away revealing a swimming pool.
Earlier this year, the UK Sun published photos of some of the more ostentatious features aboard the floating palace, including a gold-plated toilet paper holder.
