On June 24, 2024, the European Council adopted a new comprehensive package of economic and individual restrictions against Russia. The package mainly targets “high-value” economic sectors like energy, finance, and trade, but is also designed to make circumvention even more difficult.

A full list of the 116 additional sanctioned persons and entities can be found in the official press release; the corresponding regulation had not yet been published at the time of writing this Newsflash.

Highlights include:

• EU parent companies are required to ensure their third-country subsidiaries do not take part in circumvention.
• EU entities are prohibited from using Russia’s proprietary System for Transfer of Financial Messages (SPFS), developed to minimize the impact of sanctions.
• Reloading services of Russian liquified natural gas (LNG) in the EU are prohibited, if the LNG is to be transshipped to third countries.
• Vessel prohibitions as well as flight bans are expanded.
• Prohibitions for road transportation have been expanded to include EU companies owned 25% or more by a Russian individual or entity.
• Export restrictions on chemicals, plastics, excavating machinery, monitors, and electrical equipment have been added.
• Additional import restrictions on helium from Russia have been added.
• Liechtenstein has been added to the list of partner countries that apply a set of restrictive measures on imports of iron and steel from Russia, and a set of import control measures that are substantially equivalent to those of the EU.