A DESPERATE British father is offering €100,000 for information about his three-year-old son after he vanished from Marbella along with his Russian ex-partner.
Oliver Pugh, 3, was last seen on July 4 in the Costa del Sol resort in the care of his mother, social media influencer Anastasiia Chikina.
His father only reported him missing on August 7 once he realised the pair had disappeared without trace, stoking fears Chikina had fled the country to avoid losing custody.
The 32-year-old Chikinal, who has over 140,000 social media followers as a relationship influencer, was banned from leaving Spain by a Marbella court and ordered to surrender Oliver’s passport – which she claimed to have lost.
Crucially, the mother fled just as she was about to lose a bitter custody battle, with the Spanish court deciding to grant Oliver’s 36-year-old IT worker father full custody and limit her to supervised visits only.
What started as a local custody dispute has mushroomed into a diplomatic incident spanning three countries and an international manhunt, with the Spanish authorities treating it as parental abduction.
Initially, police suspected Chikina had taken Oliver to Russia, her homeland, where extradition would prove impossible.
Even Russian state media picked up the story, with analyst Vladimir Kornilov suggesting on Telegram that Oliver should be considered Russian through his mother’s nationality.
The British Foreign Office confirmed it was providing support to the family, adding a diplomatic dimension to the already complex case.
But the investigation took a dramatic turn when images posted by Chikina on social media on August 31 appeared to place her in Bangkok, Thailand – not Russia as originally feared.
The photographs, taken at Bangkok’s upmarket Iconsiam shopping centre, show the mother and her 15-year-old sister at various locations including a Cartier store.
Details like escalators, benches and ceilings have been matched to confirm the location with relative certainty.
This potential breakthrough has given new hope to Oliver’s father, as Thai authorities maintain far better international cooperation agreements than Russia when it comes to extradition cases.
Adding to the intrigue, Chikina broke her social media silence on September 5 with a cryptic post seemingly justifying her actions.
Writing to her thousands of followers, she said: “We have a difficult conversation to have. Let’s talk about how terrifying it is when the system is stacked against the child.
“The truth won’t be pleasant for everyone; it often stays behind closed doors, but here it comes out.”
The mother vanished along with other family members including her own mother Angela Nikolenko.
Their Marbella home was found completely empty, and calls to Chikina’s phone stopped connecting entirely.
In an emotional appeal published by The Scottish Sun, Oliver’s father pleaded directly with his ex-partner: “Oliver needs and deserves to have both parents in his life. By taking him away from his father, his friends, and everything familiar, the only one who is truly hurting is him.”
He described his British passport-holding son as a ‘bright and active boy’ who loves cars, aeroplanes and playing in the water.
The couple had separated in May 2024 and initially shared custody, but their relationship deteriorated as legal proceedings intensified throughout summer 2025.
Spain’s National Centre for Missing Persons activated its protocol when the father finally filed his complaint, but more than six weeks later, Oliver’s whereabouts remain unknown.
A Policia Nacional spokesperson said this week: “The investigation is ongoing. There are no updates we can provide.”
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