Poland’s main sports TV channel has dramatically pulled a pre-recorded interview with former England captain John Terry as the football star battles a furious backlash over a ‘tone deaf’ tweet praising Russian-born oligarch Roman Abramovich.
Terry rushed to Abramovich’s side as the billionaire Chelsea owner faces mounting calls for stringent sanctions over his suspected close links to Vladimir Putin’s regime following the Russian invasion of Ukraine – allegations which he vehemently denies.
Posting a photo of the pair holding the Premier League trophy on social media on Thursday, Terry called Abramovich ‘the best’ – sparking a massive backlash.
Labour MP Chris Bryant urged Terry to delete his tweet, thundering: ‘I think @JohnTerry26 you should take this down ASAP. The people of Ukraine are being bombed, shelled and murdered while you celebrate Abramovich’.
Welsh Labour MP Chris Elmore raged: ‘No self awareness and a painful reminder of the problem’, while FT journalist Chris Cook wrote: ‘As if Abramovich didn’t have enough PR problems, he’s now getting compliments from John Terry.’
On Friday afternoon, Terry posted a photo from Chelsea grounds in an apparent bid to draw a line under the blazing row.
And his Instagram profile picture has been changed to an image of the Ukrainian flag, with the words ‘Pray For Ukraine’ written across the front, though Terry’s offending tweet remains on his Twitter profile.
It has now emerged that Poland’s Canal Plus Sport channel has cancelled the broadcast of a pre-recorded interview with Terry. Journalist Jakub Krupa reported that the segment was canned after the channel deemed the post to be ‘tone deaf’.
‘Poland’s Premier League rights holder & main sports TV channel @CANALPLUS_SPORT pulls @cwiakala’s pre-recorded interview with John Terry after this tweet in solidarity with Ukraine, saying his praise for Russian oligarch Abramovich during the invasion on Ukraine is “tone deaf”’, Krupa tweeted.
Abramovich, who has yet to directly criticise Putin’s invasion but reportedly attempted to act as a broker in peace talks between the two sides, denies he is close to the Kremlin or has done anything that would merit sanctions being imposed against him.
The Russian-born oligarch has put Chelsea up for sale for £3billion having already lined up a bid led by a Swiss billionaire and is also said to be getting rid of £200million of palatial London property because he is allegedly ‘terrified of being sanctioned’.
John Terry rushed to Abramovich’s side as the billionaire Chelsea owner faces mounting calls for stringent sanctions over his suspected close links to Vladimir Putin’s regime following the Russian invasion of Ukraine – allegations which he denies
Posting a photo of the pair holding the Premier League trophy on social media on Thursday, Terry called Abramovich ‘the best’ – sparking a massive backlash. On Friday afternoon, Terry posted a photo from Chelsea grounds in an apparent bid to draw a line under the blazing row
Terry’s offending tweet remains on his Twitter profile, while his Instagram profile picture has been changed to an image of the Ukrainian flag, with the words ‘Pray For Ukraine’ written across the front
Labour MP Chris Bryant urged Terry to delete his tweet, thundering: ‘I think @JohnTerry26 you should take this down ASAP. The people of Ukraine are being bombed, shelled and murdered while you celebrate Abramovich’
Abramovich (pictured here with Vladimir Putin in 2005, while he was governor of the Cukotka region), has yet to criticise Putin’s invasion. He vehemently denies he is close to the Kremlin or has done anything that would merit sanctions being imposed against him
Abramovich is worth 10.4bn ($12.5bn), according to Forbes, and owns a £150m Kensington mansion, a £22m penthouse, and more than £1.2bn of yachts, private jets, helicopters and supercars based in Britain and around the world
He is said to have demanded bids for the West London football team by tomorrow amid claims he has launched a ‘fire sale’ to avoid having his British assets frozen.
British ministers have finally cracked down on oligarchs as Uzbekistan-born Russian billionaire Alisher Usmanov and ex-Kremlin deputy prime minister Igor Shuvalov are the latest targets of sanctions by the Government.
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has sanctioned Usmanov, who has a £60million home in Surrey and whose commercial links to Everton football club have been suspended, and Mr Shuvalov.
Shuvalov owns a £11.4million London flat overlooking the Ministry of Defence and he reportedly used a £38million private jet to fly his wife’s corgis to dog shows across Europe, including one in Windsor, but denies there is anything improper or illegal about his business activities.
The pair, who are worth a combined £14billion and have ‘significant interests in the UK and close links to the Kremlin’, are ‘sanctioned with immediate effect’, the Foreign Office said.
They face a full asset freeze and a travel ban, with Truss saying that the sanctions send a ‘clear message that we will hit oligarchs and individuals closely associated with the Putin regime’.
The two Putin associates are also now cut off from their significant UK interests including mansions worth tens of millions and no British citizen or business can deal with them.
The UK has been targeting Russian oligarchs since Moscow’s invasion, with Usmanov and Shuvalov added to the list, there is now 15 Putin associates sanctioned.
After the Foreign Office faced accusations it ‘dropped the ball’ and failed to build legally-sound cases before it made this move, the department will now set up a Oligarch Taskforce of Ministers and officials to further target Russian interests in the UK.
Boris Johnson was under huge pressure to go faster in targeting Russian oligarchs after it was claimed Britain will not sanction Roman Abramovich and others for ‘weeks or months’ – if at all.
The PM said after the new sanctions, ‘for as long as Putin continues his barbaric attack on innocent Ukrainians we will continue to exert every power we have to inflict maximum economic pain on Putin and his war machine’.
Bryant, who has been particularly critical of the decision not to sanction Abramovich claiming Johnson is ‘frightened’, said: ‘I don’t understand why we haven’t seized a single Putin oligarch yacht, palace or serious asset yet. Unlike our European neighbours’.
Tom Tugendhat, the chairman of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, called for the Government to go further to follow European allies to seize oligarchs’ assets.
‘We should be looking immediately to seize those assets linked to those who are profiting from Putin’s war machine, holding it in trust and returning it to the Russian people as soon as possible,’ he said.
Roman Abramovich has put Chelsea up for sale for £3billion having already lined up a bid led by a Swiss billionaire and is also said to be getting rid of £200million of palatial London property because he is allegedly ‘terrified of being sanctioned’
Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich (pictured with third wife Dasha Zhukova), whose money turned the club into a football powerhouse, is said to be selling off his homes having already put the club up for sale
Russians own £1.5billion of UK property. These are the homes reportedly owned by some of the highest profile billionaires
Senior Tory MP Tobias Ellwood echoed the call, warning there will be ‘increasing public anger that we’re not doing enough to help our fellow Ukrainians in their hour of need’.
The chairman of the Commons Defence Committee told PA: ‘There’s a race to squeeze Putin given the war crimes he’s now committing in Ukraine and London continues to be seen as ground zero as to where oligarchs’ investments sit. So we need to be impounding these assets in days, not weeks or months.
‘Every day we wait offers more time for the oligarchs to move their wealth to other parts of the world. Don’t forget it’s not their wealth, this is the stolen wealth from the Russian people which is utilised to keep Putin in power.’
The Times reports that the Government lawyers tried to build a case against the Chelsea owner in 2018 – but failed, warning ministers that getting it wrong could see him sue them for millions if the decision was flawed.
A senior sanctions lawyer said that Truss’ legal team has been bombarded with letters from lawyers representing oligarchs ‘to buy them time’ to sell off assets and move cash.
A Government insider said: ‘We have issues with both the legal capacity and the investigative capacity. There are some very fundamental issues in even identifying their assets, never mind linking them to the Putin regime.
‘We’re talking about weeks and months. Liz is frustrated. She wants to name Abramovich and others but has been told that she can’t. But the Foreign Office has dropped the ball on this one’.
The Prime Minister’s spokesman has since said he ‘does not recognise’ the account.
But in tacit acceptance that the sanctioning of oligarchs has not gone entirely to plan, amid rumours there could be emergency legislation introduced, he added there is a ‘constant review of whether we can do more to go even faster’.
No British-based oligarchs have lost any assets at all because of the UK Government, and have used the past week to transfer their pots of cash out of the country, often into the cryptocurrency markets, experts have said.
One senior Tory MP told MailOnline the EU was putting Britain to shame. ‘The EU is actually seizing yachts, locking up people’s houses. We’re talking about some sporting events. I don’t know what the f**k is going on, it’s not good,’ they said.
‘I don’t know what is holding it up but if it is lawyers get on the floor of the House and name the f**kers. They need to pull their finger out. This is not the time for complacency. It is shocking.’
