EXCLUSIVE: ROMAN'S £1BN GOODBYE

CHELSEA CHIEF DIVORCE DEAL

By Victoria Ward, Andy Lines And Don Mackay Victoria.Ward@Mirror.Co.Uk 15/03/2007

CHELSEA boss Roman Abramovich's divorce is likely to cost him well over £1billion, experts revealed last night.

They say that even if ex-wife Irina got only a tenth of his estimated £11billion fortune it would still be a record pay-out.

Abramovich, 40, has already handed over property worth up to £50million as part of his golden goodbye, the Mirror can reveal.

Last month he transferred at least four of his luxury UK homes to Irina, 39 - mother of his five children. They include a huge £18million estate in Sussex which was the family's main base in Britain.

Irina Abramovich

PREVIOUS highest divorce settlement was the £1billion won by Rupert Murdoch's ex-wife Anna in 1999.

HE DID IT ON THE CHEAPSKI IN RUSSIA

By Tom Parry

ROMAN Abramovich saved himself a fortune by hammering out his divorce deal in Russia rather than the UK.

In his homeland he will have been able to hold on to more cash and keep extensive details of his finances out of the public eye.

And he saved up to £1million in legal bills by going for a Russian settlement which would also have been much quicker.

A settlement figure set in Britain is likely to have given Irina 35 per cent of his fortune - £3.85 billion. In settling a divorce where large sums of money are involved, the courts here would make an allowance for any "special contribution" a wife has made to the wealth.

But in Russia divorce laws are more favourable for husbands, which is why £1billion is the most likely figure. Specialist lawyer James Stuart said: "England is one of the most generous jurisdictions in the world for financial provision for women.

"Russia, on the other hand, has a level of financial provision that is very mean."

Whoa!!!