EU trades two oligarchs for three-year sanctions

EU ambassadors reportedly agreed on 22 September to renew one of the bloc's Russia sanctions lists for three years instead of six months (EFE/Unitel, Il Foglio). The price was removing two billionaires, Mikhail Fridman and Alisher Usmanov. Neither change has legal force yet. If the removals go through, whether the men's assets stay frozen would depend on which country holds them.

What is actually in force

The list covers people accused of undermining Ukraine's territorial integrity. It is one of several EU sanctions regimes against Russia. Two legal texts hold it up. A foreign-policy decision sets who is listed and banned from travel (Decision 2014/145/CFSP). A separate law, Regulation 269/2014, makes the asset freezes binding on every bank and company in the EU.

The ambassadors' agreement changes neither text. The Council, where the 27 governments' ministers take formal decisions, has to amend both and publish them in the Official Journal, the EU's legal gazette. As of Wednesday morning, To Brief had found no published act that enacts the three-year term or the delistings. Until one appears, the list runs on the seven-day stopgap extension adopted to keep it from lapsing (To Brief).

How one veto became a bargaining chip

Renewal requires unanimity, which means any single government can block it (Article 31 TEU). That turns every deadline into leverage. Slovakia withheld its consent first. France then asked for Usmanov's removal, according to four diplomats cited by Euronews.

Latvia used the same veto to block both removals (To Brief). The reported agreement implies that Latvia has since withdrawn its objection.

France invoked national security but has not said what interest is at stake. Its delegation cited a "specific national-security issue," diplomats told Euronews. A journalist asked the Foreign Ministry on 17 September why France wanted Usmanov off the list. The spokesperson answered that Council talks were confidential (France Diplomatie). That silence has left diplomats speculating about a hidden trade, with no document to support any theory (EUobserver).

The two men were handled as a pair, but their court records diverge. The EU's General Court struck down Fridman's original listing in April 2024 for lack of evidence, and it upheld Usmanov's in February 2024 (CURIA, T-301/22, CURIA, T-237/22). If enacted, the bargain would remove Usmanov despite a listing the court upheld. Paris sought that result and has declined to explain it in public.

Where a freeze goes after delisting

An EU listing obliges every bank in every member state to freeze a person's assets. A national measure reaches only its own territory. Latvia's sanctions law lets Riga impose its own freezes and entry bans (Latvian sanctions law). Those would bind Latvian banks, but not a German or Italian bank holding the same assets.

Italy shows the other extreme. Its 2022 freeze of Sardinian villas linked to Usmanov rested on the EU listing, and no separate Italian order has surfaced (Il Foglio). Once a delisting takes effect, Rome would probably have no legal basis to keep the villas frozen. Germany falls in between. A Frankfurt court ruled in June that authorities had not proved Usmanov controls the yacht Dilbar, and only a pending appeal keeps the vessel held (taz).

What the longer term buys

A three-year term would give banks and companies more predictability. It would also remove many of the scheduled deadlines at which one government can threaten the whole list. The Council could still amend listings between deadlines, and listed people could still sue. What shrinks is the number of compulsory moments when all 27 governments must agree to keep the remaining names on the list.

The Council now owes a published legal text before any of this binds anyone. Paris owes the national-security case it has so far declined to make. If the delisting takes effect, whether Usmanov's assets stay frozen would no longer be an EU decision. It would depend on the law of whichever country holds them.

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Note to editor (not for publication): I could not supply four sources you asked for, so I rewrote the claims to fit the links I have. (1) I have no EUR-Lex link for Regulation 269/2014, so it is named but not linked. (2) I have no timestamped Official Journal or Council-register check, so the "no published act" line is attributed to To Brief's own check. (3) I have no Latvian adopting act, so Latvia now appears only as having legal power to impose national bans, not as having adopted them. (4) The seven-day bridge cites our earlier story. For the core bargain, I cross-cited Il Foglio's 22 September report alongside EFE. I cut the Luxembourg reference because I could not attribute it.