Russian accused of stealing Stalin's summer retreat

He and his chief henchmen built luxurious residences at the sun-kissed Black Sea resort in Abkhazia, 1,000 miles south of Moscow but, when the elite were in town, at the heart of Soviet politics.

Now Cold River - Kholodnaya Rechka in Russian - is once again at the centre of intense politicking, this time giving rise to a territorial dispute between Russia, Abkhazia and the late dictator's native republic of Georgia.

Tensions have flared after it emerged that Stalin's dacha, whose interior, furniture and fittings have been painstakingly preserved, had been bought for $10m (£6m) by Oleg Deripaska, one of Russia's richest men.

Georgia, which abuts Abkhazia and denies the republic's very right to exist, insists that what Mr Deripaska has purchased is stolen property. Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili insists that Abkhazia - including Stalin's dacha - belongs to his country, and he wants both back.

However the independent Abkhazians are having none of it and are also insisting, with Russian backing, on their right to sell Kholodnaya Rechka and a clutch of other luxurious holiday retreats in the area.

The Abkhazians drove Georgian troops and some 150,000 Georgians out of the republic in 1993 with the help of Russian arms and volunteers in a war of secession that devastated their republic. Little has been rebuilt since and the Abkhazians are relying on Russian money and the proceeds of property sales to rebuild the republic.

Kholodnaya Rechka is just one of five dachas Stalin maintained in the republic but was perhaps the most famous. The olive-green, two-storey dacha was built in the 1930s on Stalin's personal orders. Hidden by pines, it could not be seen from the sea, and is hard to spot from the air. The paranoid dictator liked it that way.

So security conscious was he that he did not even swim in the sea but had salt water piped into his bathroom. Two other pipes delivered fresh cold and hot water. The dacha still contains Stalin's bed - which was specially shortened since he was just under 5ft 7in but hated to feel small.

When walking in the grounds he did not like to stumble across his own guards who resorted to hiding among the pine trees. On one occasion local boys unwittingly wandered on to his private beach, earning their unfortunate parents 10-year stints in the Gulag. It is connected to the beach by a specially built elevator and can only be reached by a narrow winding road.

Before Mr Deripaska bought Kholodnaya Rechka tourists could stay there and, for $50, could even sleep in Stalin's bed.

Abkhazia's climate and Black Sea coastline saw it nicknamed the "Soviet Riviera" in Communist times. Mikhail Gorbachev had a sumptuous dacha in the republic as did Nikita Khrushchev, who was to succeed Stalin, and the dictator's hated Soviet secret police chief Lavrenty Beria.