Tucked away in a Guardian article otherwise about allegations of breaches of the UK’s sanctions, it is being reported that the Cypriot Ministry of Finance has confirmed that it is investigating whether Cypriot subsidiaries of the Essar Group entered into transactions with Russia’s VTB Bank that breached, or circumvented, the EU’s sanctions.
The allegations relate to the movement of debt obligations owed by the Essar Group to VTB Bank from Cyprus to Mauritius in 2022.
Poland’s National Tax Administration has fined a company based in Małopolska and run by Belarusian citizens PLN 20,000,000 – or approximately €4,726,000. The fine is administrative, and was the maximum allowable fine.
The company had exported over 100 luxury cars to Russia via Lithuania and Belarus in breach of EU sanctions.
The total value of the cars is said to have been PLN 49m. The press release states that “The evidence gathered indicates that the company’s managers acted knowingly and deliberately participated in the circumvention of sanctions”.
The press release does not mention if proceedings are also being brought against the individuals involved or if the company will be subject to a confiscation of its profits.
The UK’s National Crime Agency has published a press release confirming that it has charged John Michael Ormerod with two counts of breaches the UK’s Russian sanctions as well as a money laundering offence.
Ormerod was designated by the UK on 20 May 2025, and the charges relate to his efforts to transfer £200,000 on the same day in breach of the asset freeze imposed upon him.
Ormerod’s UK listing had been lifted on 2 March 2026.
After an internal review of its compliance program, Deutsche Bank is reported to have self-reported possible breaches of the imposed deposit limit of €100,000 set by the EU’s Russian sanctions to the Bundesbank.
The story was first reported in Finanz-Szene (behind a pay wall).
Further to our earlier post, the owner of the “shadow fleet” vessel the MV Deyna, agreed in a Marseilles Court on Wednesday to pay an undisclosed fine for the release of the vessel.
The owner admitted that it had no evidence to support the vessel’s alleged Mozambique flag status.
Upon payment the vessel was released and is now reported to have left French waters.
On Friday 3 April, the Swedish Coast Guard boarded and seized control of the sanctioned “shadow fleet” tanker the Flora 1. The vessel is suspected of having caused a 12 km (8 mile) oil spill in the Baltic Sea near the island of Gotland.
The vessel was then anchored off Ystad.
The Coast Guard’s press release states that the vessel’s flag status is uncertain, and states that “this is the first time we have been able to trace a discharge to a vessel subject to sanctions, and which may be suspected of environmental crimes”.
We have updated our vessel seizure tracker.
The vessel has since been released, with the Coast Guard citing a lack of evidence linking the vessel to the oil spill, and that the Coast Guard had been able to confirm the flag status of the vessel.
Further to our earlier post, it is now being reported that the Bulgarian authorities have extradited Russian national Oleg Olshansky to face charges of breaching the US’s Russian sanctions and money laundering.
Mr Olshansky had appealed an earlier decision approving his extradition.
Mr Olshansky and another Russian national extradited from Bulgaria, Mr Sergey Ivin have now been charged by the US authorities.
German Customs has issued a press release announcing raids as part of investigations into the suspected Russian exports by three separate companies. A total of 14 residential and commercial properties were raided in the Rhine-Main area.
The press release states that the investigations first arose out of a routine Customs audit:
“there is a suspicion that two of the companies have commercially exported various machine parts and chemical substances to Russia in violation of an existing ban. To this end, they allegedly used a transport company and other foreign logistics service providers to sell or export sanctioned goods from the Rhine-Main region to the Russian Federation without authorisation by means of so-called circumvention exports via neighbouring states”.
The actions of the third company are not specified.
The UK’s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation has issued a Penalty Notice fining the Irish-incorporated company Apple Distribution International Limited (“ADIL”), £390,000 for breaches of the UK’s Russian sanctions.
ADIL was fined for issuing payment instructions to a UK bank, and for failing to cancel those payment instructions. The two payments in June and July 2022 for a total of £635,618.75 were to Okko LLC, a company wholly owned by the designated person JSC New Opportunities.
OFSI took the view that the instructions issued to a UK bank, and the failure to cancel those instructions, amounted to conduct within the UK for the purposes of the jurisdictional reach of the UK’s sanctions. This is in line with older case law that had established that sending instructions into the UK could amount to an offence within the UK.
ADIL self-disclosed the conduct in October 2022. The Penalty Notice was also arrived at by way of an agreed settlement pursuant to OFSI’s new enforcement procedures.
The penalty is also noteworthy because JSC New Opportunities was designated by the UK at 11am on 29 June 2022. The first payment instruction had been made on 6 June but with a value date of 30 June. The second payment instruction was issued on 30 June with a value date of 28 July 2022.
OFSI took the view that there was a “narrow window” in which the first payment could have been stopped, and that it was an aggravating factor justifying enforcement action that a second payment had been ordered. The Penalty Notice also expressly states that OFSI was relying on the “strict liability” enforcement rules that come into effect in 15 June 2022. Earlier payments made to Okko LLC, while it had been owned by a different designated person were also made in breach of the UK’s sanctions, but were not the subject of OFSI’s enforcement action as they took place before the coming into force of the “strict liability” rules.
OFSI also stated that despite the failings of the external screening provider used by ADLI, it was ultimately ADLI’s responsibility as the payment issuer, to ensure compliance with the UK’s sanctions.
Further to our earlier post relating to the trial of the captain of the Boracay, the shadow fleet vessel seized by France in October 2025.
The trial has concluded with the Chinese national captain, Chen Zhangjie, sentenced to a year’s jail and ordered to pay a fine of €150,000.
As the captain was tried in absentia, the French authorities have issued an arrest warrant for him.
The offence that was the basis of the conviction was for failing to stop the Boracay when ordered to do so.
