The removal of Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Friedman from the EU sanctions lists shows that it is very difficult to maintain unanimity, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.
"This shows that maintaining unanimity is very difficult. And this will be of great significance – whether through the courts, through legislation, through sanctions, or through business," Zelenskyy said at a press conference in New York on Tuesday.
The president said he had discussed this issue today with several European officials.
As reported, the ambassadors – the permanent representatives of EU member states – following a discussion that had lasted the past few weeks, finally decided to extend the sanctions for violations of Ukraine's territorial integrity for three years instead of six months, as had been the case previously, but this came at the cost of excluding Usmanov and Fridman from the sanctions list at the request of Slovakia, France, and Luxembourg.
Ukraine imposed targeted sanctions against Russian oligarchs Usmanov and Fridman on October 19, 2022. As the Ukrainian Ministry of Economy noted at the time, sanctions were imposed that day against 256 individuals – oligarchs from the Forbes list and their associates. The list included Friedman's partners at Alfa Group – Petr Aven, German Khan, and Alexei Kuzmichov – as well as Vladimir Lisin, Leonid Mikhelson, Arkady and Boris Rotenberg, Mikhail Prokhorov, Suleiman Kerimov, Elena Baturina, Yuri Kovalchuk, and others.
A major asset of Friedman and his partners – Sense Bank (formerly Alfa-Bank) – was nationalized by Ukraine in the summer of 2023. In 2022, ARMA also took control, by court order, of the corporate rights and other assets of IDS Ukraine – a group linked to Friedman and the country's largest producer and distributor of mineral water.
In September 2024, the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine filed a lawsuit with the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC) seeking to forfeit the assets of IDS Ukraine and other Ukrainian assets linked to Friedman to the state. Specifically, the case involved shares and stakes in the Myrhorod Mineral Water Plant, Morshyn "Oscar" Mineral Water Plant, Industrial and Distribution Systems, Alfa Insurance, and Alfa-Leasing Ukraine. Hearings in this case are still ongoing.
As for the Ukrainian assets of Usmanov and his business partners – the Skoch and Streshinsky families – in 2024, the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC), acting on a lawsuit filed by the Ministry of Justice, had already ruled to forfeit them to the state. According to information from then-Deputy Minister of Justice Inna Bahatykh, the assets in question include more than 165,000 metric tonnes of iron ore products with an estimated value of over UAH 2 billion, as well as 100% of the charter capital of Peter-Service Ukraine LLC – an IT company previously controlled by Usmanov.
