A Crimea sea-view apartment owned by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s wife in Russian-occupied Ukraine has been sold off at auction by the Kremlin.

The luxury flat in the village of Livadia was knocked down to Moscow estate agent Olga Lypovetska for RUB 44.3 million (GBP 395,779) on 30th October.

First Lady Olena Zelenska was forced to abandon the apartment in 2014 when the Crimean Peninsula was illegally annexed by Russia.

She had bought it a year earlier, according to Ukrainian media, for the equivalent of USD 164,000 (GBP 135,000).

Proceeds from the sale are reportedly being channelled back to the Kremlin to help finance Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.

The auction had started with a bid of just RUB 1.2 million (GBP 10,754) but grew rapidly.

The 120-square-metre (1,292-square-foot) flat has a grand balcony that looks out onto the Black Sea.

And occupants can also see the Livadia Palace, once the holiday home of the last Russian Tsar, Nicholas II, who was shot by the Bolsheviks in 1918.

Visitors climb a flight of stone stairs flanked by statues of lions to get into the building.

The large apartment, located on the fifth floor of the building, also reportedly comes with a parking space outside the ‘Emperor’ residential complex.

Russian authorities in occupied Crimea had previously announced that the apartment had been “nationalised”.

At the time of writing, Olena Zelenska’s press service had not yet commented on the sale.