{"id":36683,"date":"2026-09-22T15:04:36","date_gmt":"2026-09-22T15:04:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/?p=36683"},"modified":"2026-09-22T15:04:37","modified_gmt":"2026-09-22T15:04:37","slug":"eu-renews-russia-sanctions-but-removes-usmanov-at-frances-request","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/?p=36683","title":{"rendered":"EU renews Russia sanctions but removes Usmanov at France&#8217;s request"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">France succeeded in its push to remove Alisher Usmanov from the EU sanctions list as part of a prisoner release with Azerbaijan. A second high-profile businessman, Mikhail Fridman, was also removed.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The European Union has agreed to remove Uzbek-Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov from its sanctions list after fraught negotiations that saw France link his delisting to a prisoner release with Azerbaijan, unsettling Brussels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A second Russian oligarch, Mikhail Fridman, was also removed after Slovakia vetoed his continued listing, several diplomats told Euronews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Luxembourg had argued that if Usmanov was removed, Fridman should be too. Fridman has filed a $16 billion claim against Luxembourg over his frozen assets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ambassadors sealed the compromise on Tuesday afternoon after two weeks of drawn-out talks that brought the bloc&#8217;s sanctions regime to the brink of collapse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Latvia <strong>held up the process<\/strong>on Monday, warning it was not the right time to ease pressure on Moscow. The Baltic country relented on Tuesday afternoon and opted for a constructive abstention, enabling the necessary unanimity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As a way to offset the pain of delisting the two high-profile businessmen, the EU will extend its individual sanctions on Russia for an unprecedented 36 months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Previously, the measures were renewed every six months, giving member states regular opportunities to seek concessions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>France succeeded in its push to remove Alisher Usmanov from the EU sanctions list as part of a prisoner release with Azerbaijan. A second high-profile businessman, Mikhail Fridman, was also removed. The European Union has agreed to remove Uzbek-Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov from its sanctions list after fraught negotiations that saw France link his delisting [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36684,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36683"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36683\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36685,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36683\/revisions\/36685"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/36684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsreporters.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}