Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha harshly reacted to the recent decision by the European Union to lift restrictive measures against Russian billionaires Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Fridman. The head of the Ukrainian foreign ministry called this situation outrageous and emphasized that Kyiv fought fiercely at both public and closed diplomatic levels trying to prevent the lifting of sanctions against these individuals.
Asymmetric response and a new sanctions list
Commenting on Brussels' decision, the Ukrainian minister promised a mirror and asymmetric response from Kyiv. According to Andrii Sybiha, in response to the exclusion of two Russian oligarchs, Ukraine intends to add more than twenty new representatives of major Russian business to its sanctions lists. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has already approved this expanded list of individuals, and the process of its formalization is currently underway.
International pressure and national jurisdictions
Kyiv intends not only to return Usmanov and Fridman under international restrictions but also to achieve their personal prosecution in the national jurisdictions of other states. Sybiha noted that Canada has already assured the Ukrainian side that it will maintain sanctions against these individuals. In addition, active diplomatic work is underway with Great Britain, Japan, Australia, and other partners to close any loopholes for Russian oligarchs to evade restrictions.
Contradictory data
While the European Union made a controversial decision to remove Usmanov and Fridman from sanctions due to legal nuances and court proceedings, Canada and a number of other Western coalition states took a fundamentally different stance. Official Ottawa confirmed its intention to keep these billionaires on its blacklists, creating a legal collision in the consistency of sanctions policies between G7 countries and the EU that requires resolution at the highest diplomatic level.
