Roman Abramovich, the owner of Chelsea Football Club, has been added to the UK government’s sanctions list over his links to Vladimir Putin.
Announcing the move on Thursday, Boris Johnson said there could be “no safe havens for those who have supported Putin’s vicious assault on Ukraine”.
Abramovich put Chelsea up for sale on March 2 in the wake of Russia’s continued invasion of Ukraine.
The decision to impose sanctions on him means he will no longer be able to sell the club without government permission.
Nadine Dorries, the culture secretary, said Chelsea would be given a “special licence” allowing it to play fixtures and pay its staff.
But only existing season ticket holders will be allowed to attend games.
Jets and yachts owned or chartered by Abramovich, who is worth about £9.4 billion, can been seized, the sanctions say.
Six other wealthy Russians have also been added to the sanctions list. Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, said they had the “blood of the Ukrainian people” on their hands.
David Lammy, Labour’s shadow foreign secretary said it was the right deceision but “should not have taken the government weeks”.
“Too few oligarchs linked to Putin’s rogue regime have so far faced sanctions from the UK government. We are lagging far behind allies in the EU and the US,” he said.