Petr Aven and Mikhail Fridman, co-founders and former shareholders of Alfa Group, were under US sanctions. This was reported by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).
The announcement was published on the ministry’s website. The Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP) was also included in the sanctions list. The organization has never been under US sanctions before.
“The wealthy Russian elite must get rid of the illusion that they can do business as usual while the Kremlin is at war with Ukraine” – declaration US Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Adewale Adeyemo.
Sanctions were imposed against Petr Aven (Alpha shareholder and former board member of the group), Mikhail Fridman (co-founder and former board member of Alfa Group).
In addition, US Treasury restrictions are imposed against German Khan and Alexei Kuzmichev, co-founders of Alfa Group, former shareholders of Alfa Bank.
OFAC reported that participation in the activities of the Alfa Group Supervisory Board is linked to the imposition of sanctions. The report also says that Aven is the head of a Russian insurance company, Fridman takes an active part in the work of the RSPP, Khan heads a number of construction companies, and Kuzmichev runs an investment company.
The US Treasury administration justified the sanctions against the RSPP, saying that the union “promotes import substitution” in Russia and is linked to counter-sanctions.
In the press service of Alfa-Bank declaration RBC said imposing sanctions on Fridman and Aven did not affect the financial institution’s operations. They left the board in the spring of 2022 following the imposition of personal sanctions by the UK, Canada and the EU.
Petr Aven now owns 12% of the shares of the financial institution, and Mikhail Fridman owns 33% of the bank. Khan and Kuzmichev withdrew from shareholders – the first under the sanctions of London and Ottawa, and the second – under the sanctions of the entire EU.
Petr Aven and Mikhail Fridman challenged the imposition of personal EU sanctions in court.
The EU imposed sanctions on Aven on February 28, 2022, calling the billionaire “one of Vladimir Putin’s closest oligarchs” and “a particularly close friend of Rosneft chief Igor Sechin”. The EU stressed that Aven “benefits from his links in power”, that he is “actively supported and profited, financially or financially” from leaders responsible for the annexation of Crimea and the “destabilization of Ukraine”.
In addition, Aven and his partner Fridman allegedly “participated in the Kremlin’s attempts to lift US sanctions to counter Russia’s aggressive policy towards Ukraine.” The EU noted that Putin “rewarded Alfa Group’s loyalty” by providing political assistance to the consortium’s foreign investment plans.
British officials said Aven was “a prominent Russian businessman and pro-Kremlin oligarch”.
“I am not close to Putin but to do business in Russia I need to contact the president and if they call me from the Kremlin I have to answer. It is very strange that sanctions are imposed for meeting with the president. <…> “I represented the Alpha Group in talks with Putin, but I never represented myself,” he said. He denied that he was a close friend of Sechin. The billionaire described the EU’s statement as “deliberate misrepresentations” that Europe is trying to justify sanctions.
Also, the scandal arose from a letter from the former head of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (included in the register of organizations banned in Russia, recognized by the Ministry of Justice as an extremist organization, acting as a foreign agent). Leonid Volkov (recognized as a foreign agent in the Russian Federation) to Josep Borrell, head of European diplomacy, with a request to lift sanctions against Alfa Group leaders. Volkov denied appealing to the European authorities, but after Alexei Venicetov, the former editor-in-chief of the shut down Echo of Moscow radio station (known as a foreign agent in the Russian Federation), published a letter, Volkov called his action “a major political mistake.” As a result, the sanctions were not lifted and Volkov resigned as head of the FBK.