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Sailing Yacht A, the 142.8-meter superyacht that Italy seized from Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko in 2022, is leaving the port of Trieste after more than four years and heading to Ancona, where it will be laid up for six months before a refit.
Keeping the vessel has cost the Italian state more than €40 million ($44.8 million) since the seizure. The bill falls on the national budget because the yacht remains frozen under European Union sanctions while Melnichenko's legal challenge winds through the courts.
The move to Ancona, a shipbuilding center on Italy's Adriatic coast, is the first time the yacht has left Trieste since Italian authorities impounded it in March 2022, weeks after Russia's invasion of Ukraine and shortly after the EU placed Melnichenko on its sanctions list.
A costly asset to guard
Sailing Yacht A is the largest sailing yacht in the world. Built by Nobiskrug in Kiel, Germany, and designed inside and out by Philippe Starck, it carries three freestanding carbon-fiber masts nearly 100 meters tall and 4,500 square meters of sail. It can host 20 guests in 10 cabins and has a range of 5,340 nautical miles at 16 knots. It has been valued at about €450 million.
Running costs have climbed steadily. Annual upkeep has been estimated at about €10 million, paid by the Italian state, and the bill had reached about €18 million by early 2024.
The legal fight
Melnichenko has fought the seizure in Italian and EU courts. The company that owns the yacht argued that, before sanctions were imposed, control passed from a trust benefiting Melnichenko to one benefiting his wife, Aleksandra. Both trusts were later sanctioned.
The EU General Court rejected one of Melnichenko's challenges in February 2025. After the Lazio regional administrative court in Rome asked the EU Court of Justice whether assets held through trust structures are covered by sanctions, the EU court ruled that "ownership" and "control" extend to trust beneficiaries even without direct access to the assets. The Rome court is now deciding the case in light of that ruling, and the seizure stays in place until a final decision.
Melnichenko, 54, made his fortune in fertilizer and coal. He founded EuroChem Group AG, one of the world's largest fertilizer producers, and coal miner SUEK. He stepped down from both companies' boards in March 2022, the day after the EU sanctioned him. He has said he has no political ties and calls the sanctions unjustified.
Figures were converted at €1 to $1.12.
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