From left to right: Tatiana Akhmedova, gold digger, Baroness Shackleton of Belgravia, highest-paid divorce lawyer in the UK. Shackleton saved Paul McCartney a fortune in his divorce with Heather Mills, so she isn’t completely evil.

A piece by Frances Gibb (Legal Editor) on the front page of today’s Times. The 2016 award of £453 million to Tatiana Akhmedov for “equal contributions to the welfare of the family” during their 20-year-long marriage is equivalent to over £62,000 per day. To be fair, she claims to have raised their two sons without the help of a nanny, £62,000 per day seems reasonable. Nannies don’t come cheap. The piece:

A Russian billionaire ordered to hand £453 million to his former wife was named yesterday in what is thought to be Britain’s biggest divorce case.

Farkhad Akhmedov, who featured this week on the US “Putin list” of officials and oligarchs close to the Kremlin, was ordered to give Tatiana Akhmedova 41.5 per cent of his “staggering” wealth by a High Court judge in London in 2016. An order prevented the couple’s identification after Ms Akhmedova, who is in her mid-forties, expressed fears for her safety. Yesterday, however, details of the case, and the couple’s lavish lifestyle, were revealed in the Court of Appeal.

Mr Akhmedov, 62, a gas and oil tycoon who is a close friend of Roman Abramovich, the owner of Chelsea football club, married more than 20 years ago. The couple moved to London in 1993 and Ms Akhmedova brought up their two sons without a nanny, the court was told. They lived in a £39 million mansion in Surrey and had a £27.8 million holiday home.

Mr Akhmedov’s solicitor is appealing against the divorce ruling, claiming that the billionaire — who is seeking to join the appeal — was the victim of “manifestly unjust” favouritism towards his ex-wife by the British courts. She had argued that she was due almost half their £1 billion fortune because of her “equal contributions to the welfare of the family”. Ms Akhmedova says she has received almost nothing.

The previous highest divorce payout was made public in 2014 when Jamie Cooper-Hohn, estranged wife of the financier Sir Chris Hohn, was awarded £337 million. Last year Khoo Kay Peng, the boss of Laura Ashley, was ordered to pay his ex-wife, Pauline Chai, £64 million. Such awards have given London the reputation of being “the divorce capital of the world”.

No sanctions are being applied to the 200-strong Putin list, which includes Mr Akhmedov and was released by the Trump administration yesterday, but it is seen as a possible blueprint for future measures.

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