MILAN (Reuters) -A fire broke out in the early hours of Wednesday at a villa belonging to Russian state TV host Vladimir Soloviev on the shores of Lake Como in northern Italy, causing limited damage, firefighters said.
The wall of a second Soloviev villa near the lake was daubed with spray-paint and red paint was also poured into the water in its swimming pool, two investigative sources said.
The graffiti on the wall outside the entrance to the villa read “Killer” and “No war”, the sources added.
The houses are part of the properties worth in total 8 million euros ($8.7 million) owned by Soloviev around Italy’s Lake Como that Italian police said they seized after he and other oligarchs were placed on an EU sanctions list following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The Carabinieri police said they were investigating the fire, which is suspected arson, and the spray-painting without giving further details.
A spokesman for the Como fire brigade said it had intervened at 6 a.m. (0400 GMT) to extinguish the fire, which he said was started using tyres.
“The operation was completed at 8 a.m. and the damage was limited”, he said, adding the two-storey building was under renovation and uninhabited. ($1 = 0.9171 euros)
(Reporting by Emilio Parodi, editing by Barbara Lewis and Keith Weir)
