{"id":1442396,"date":"2026-09-21T20:25:25","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T17:25:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/eu-countries-agree-to-lift-sanctions-on-russian-businessmen-usmanov-and-fridman\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T20:25:25","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T17:25:25","slug":"eu-countries-agree-to-lift-sanctions-on-russian-businessmen-usmanov-and-fridman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/eu-countries-agree-to-lift-sanctions-on-russian-businessmen-usmanov-and-fridman\/","title":{"rendered":"EU countries agree to lift sanctions on Russian businessmen Usmanov and Fridman"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ambassadors from all 27 EU countries have agreed to lift sanctions on Russian businessmen Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Fridman. However, there is no final decision yet – it can still be blocked by any EU country.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This was reported<\/a> by Reuters, citing European diplomats.<\/p>\n

The lifting of sanctions on Usmanov and Fridman was part of an agreement to extend other sanctions against Russia. Restrictions on thousands of Russian individuals and entities are to be extended for three years at once. Previously, they were usually extended for six or 12 months.<\/p>\n

According to Reuters, France and Slovakia wanted to lift sanctions on Usmanov, and Luxembourg wanted to lift sanctions on Fridman.<\/p>\n

European diplomats told the publication that France may have insisted on Usmanov’s removal from the list due to pressure from Azerbaijan, whose name has been linked to the detention of at least two French citizens in that country.<\/p>\n

Azerbaijan denies such a connection. French authorities have also not publicly confirmed that they requested the lifting of sanctions against Usmanov.<\/p>\n

In Fridman’s case, the situation is related to Luxembourg. The Russian businessman is demanding $16 billion from the country in an arbitration case.<\/p>\n

According to diplomats, Luxembourg feared that after the sanctions against Usmanov were lifted, it would be more difficult for it to advocate for the maintenance of restrictions against Fridman.<\/p>\n

Ukraine has already spoken out against such a decision. Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga said that there are no reasons to lift sanctions on Russian businessmen.<\/p>\n

“What has changed? Nothing. Removing them from the sanctions lists is unacceptable and will send the wrong signal to Moscow at a time when pressure should be increasing,” Sibiga said.<\/p>\n

He called on the EU, on the contrary, to strengthen sanctions against Russia and add new individuals to the sanctions lists.<\/p>\n

The European Union imposed sanctions against Usmanov and Fridman in 2022. They include a freeze on assets in EU countries and a ban on entry.<\/p>\n

Fridman is a co-founder of the Russian Alfa Group. He was also previously a co-owner of Sense Bank, formerly Alfa-Bank Ukraine. Ukraine nationalized the bank in 2023. <\/p>\n

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<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ambassadors from all 27 EU countries have agreed to lift sanctions on Russian businessmen Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Fridman. However, there is no final decision yet – it can still be blocked by any EU country. This was reported by Reuters, citing European diplomats. The lifting of sanctions on Usmanov and Fridman was part of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":1442391,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"class_list":["post-1442396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bez-kategoriyi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1442396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1442396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1442391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1442396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1442396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}