After the start of the war and the imposition of sanctions, Russian billionaires changed the direction of flights from Europe to the Middle East and Central Asia. The New York Times writes about it.

The journalists analyzed more than 2,000 business jet flights. It turned out that before the start of the Russian war against Ukraine, private planes flying from Moscow most often flew to the UK, France and Switzerland. After the start of the invasion and the imposition of European sanctions, their final destinations changed to the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan.

If earlier the most popular cities for Russian oligarchs were Paris, Milan and Geneva, now it has become Dubai. Before the start of the war, only 3% of private aircraft flew from Russian cities to the UAE. In April, this figure rose to 6%, and by May - up to 14%.

Besides, Dubai is the place where the oligarchs park their planes. A total of 70 Russian aircraft were stationed there, according to the NYT analysis, some of which had only recently returned to Russia.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the closure of European airspace to Russian oligarch aircraft on February 27. Despite this, they continued to fly in European airspace. This was written by the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag, which studied flight tracking data. In total, the publication recorded about 30 such flights.