The European Union is discussing sanctioning some of Russia’s wealthiest tycoons as well as top officials in state companies and media in a further ratcheting up of its penalties for Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, according to documents seen by Bloomberg.
The list, which still needs to be approved by European governments and could change before that happens, includes a handful of billionaires who haven’t yet been hit by sanctions in the U.S.: metals tycoon Alisher Usmanov, Alfa Group owners Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven, plus Alexei Mordashov, who controls a major steel company.
Also proposed for restrictions are President Vladimir Putin’s longtime spokesman Dmitry Peskov, as well as a number of state-media figures the EU accuses in the documents of spreading disinformation. Cellist and longtime Putin friend Sergei Roldugin is on the proposed list.
The EU is also looking to include executives at top state companies, as well as military and security officials, many of whom have already been sanctioned by the U.S. in recent years. The proposed list includes Igor Sechin, chief executive officer of oil company Rosneft, and Nikolay Tokarev, CEO of oil company Transneft.
The EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell told reporters on Sunday that “we have agreed to increase the peoples and entities that are going to be subject to restrictive measures, the full list will be finished” at a meeting of EU ambassadors.
“This includes Russian oligarchs and businessmen whose listing carries huge economic impact and political figures who hold key role in the Putin system in Russia,” he said.
While the U.S. isn’t announcing any further action for now, the Biden administration has made it clear that no Russian oligarch or family members are safe from sanctions, a White House official said.
The EU has announced it will cut some Russian banks out of SWIFT, the international payments system, and impose restrictions on the country’s central bank, in a move coordinated with the U.S. and the U.K. Earlier on Sunday European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the bloc would ban Russian state-backed media RT and Sputnik, Russian aircraft from its airspace and increase military aid to Ukraine.
Initial sanctions on 23 high-ranking individuals agreed to last week in retaliation for Putin’s recognition of separatist territories in eastern Ukraine included banking executives, military chiefs, media figures and a top Kremlin official, but not that many billionaires.
