Why it matters: Attorney General Merrick Garland said it marked the first seizure by the newly formed Russian Justice Ministry’s task force, adding that “it will not be the last.”

“Together with our international partners, we will do everything possible to hold accountable any individual whose criminal acts allow the Russian government to continue its unjust war,” Garland said. The Treasury Department estimated the value of the yacht at $ 90 million.

Wexelberg has been fined by the Finance Ministry since at least 2018, although the ministry announced new sanctions against him last month in support of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Vekselberg is the president of the Renova Group, a Russian group in aluminum, oil, energy and telecommunications.

What they say: The Spanish Civil Guard said in a statement on Monday that it had assisted the FBI and Homeland Security investigations into seizing the yacht, named “Tango”, at a shipyard in Mallorca, as originally reported by the AP.

“During the entry and the search carried out inside the yacht, various documents and computer devices were confiscated, which will be analyzed, among other things, to confirm the identity of the real owner,” he said. He said the ship was sailing under the flag of the Cook Islands and belonged to a company registered in the British Virgin Islands that operates companies in Panama through what the Guard called “a complex economic and corporate plan to conceal its true ownership”. The Justice Department said the 255-foot luxury yacht was seized as part of a US bank fraud, money laundering and law enforcement crackdown as part of a US Vekselberg investigation.

The big picture: All of Vekselberg’s assets in the US were already frozen and US companies were barred from doing business with him and his entities.

The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control located the Tango and a $ 90 million aircraft (tail number P4-MIS) that also belonged to Vekselberg as an expropriated property last month.

Go deeper: EU to hit Russia with new sanctions after Bucha’s assassination