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Mikhail Fridman’s removal from the European Union’s sanctions list has not ended his approximately $16 billion compensation claim against Luxembourg. Reporting published on 15 October 2026 says the businessman’s lawyer acknowledged Luxembourg’s role in securing the delisting, while leaving open whether Fridman will continue pursuing the arbitration. The distinction is important for Luxembourg: a change in sanctions status does not automatically settle a claim alleging that earlier restrictions caused compensable losses. The amount sought by Fridman is a claim, not a judgment requiring the state to pay that sum. The arbitration remains unresolved in the reporting available. Fridman was sanctioned in February 2022 after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The restrictions froze his funds and economic resources, including investment interests held through Luxembourg. He later challenged the sanctions and initiated investment arbitration against Luxembourg in 2024, seeking approximately $16 billion under a bilateral investment treaty dating from 1989 between the Belgium–Luxembourg Economic Union and the Soviet Union. The EU General Court annulled the acts listing and maintaining Fridman on the sanctions list for the period from 28 February 2022 to 15 March 2023. The court found that the evidence cited by the Council was insufficient to substantiate the relevant criteria for that period. Subsequent listings remained in place and were challenged separately, so the earlier judgment should not be read as a blanket ruling against every later listing. On 22 September 2026, EU member states agreed to remove Fridman and fellow businessman Alisher Usmanov from the sanctions list while extending restrictions on roughly 3,000 other listed individuals and entities for three years, according to the CEOWORLD report. France pressed for Usmanov’s removal, while Luxembourg sought equivalent treatment for Fridman. The agreement was reached through negotiations requiring unanimity among the EU’s 27 member states for the renewal of the sanctions regime. Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Luc Frieden presented the government’s position as serving the national interest. Accounts of a closed parliamentary committee meeting on 12 October, cited by CEOWORLD through reporting by the Kyiv Independent, said Frieden connected that interest to the effort to make Fridman’s arbitration disappear, given the scale of the claim relative to Luxembourg’s budget. Those descriptions are attributed accounts of the meeting, not a published transcript or a tribunal finding about the government’s motives. Fridman’s lawyer, Aaron Bass of Paris firm Kiejman & Marembert, told Paperjam that his client was assessing his legal strategy and acknowledged Luxembourg’s positive role in lifting the sanctions. The report did not establish that Fridman had agreed to abandon his compensation demand. Nor did it identify a settlement that would bring the arbitration to an end. For Luxembourg, the concrete issue is that the sanctions decision and the financial dispute remain separate. The government helped secure a change in Fridman’s status, but the available reporting does not show that this eliminated the claim. The tribunal has not been reported to have awarded the requested compensation, and the ultimate outcome remains unresolved.
Mikhail Fridman’s removal from the European Union’s sanctions list has not ended his approximately $16 billion compensation claim against Luxembourg. Reporting published on 15 October 2026 says the businessman’s lawyer acknowledged Luxembourg’s role in securing the delisting, while leaving open whether Fridman will continue pursuing the arbitration.
The distinction is important for Luxembourg: a change in sanctions status does not automatically settle a claim alleging that earlier restrictions caused compensable losses. The amount sought by Fridman is a claim, not a judgment requiring the state to pay that sum. The arbitration remains unresolved in the reporting available.
Fridman was sanctioned in February 2022 after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The restrictions froze his funds and economic resources, including investment interests held through Luxembourg. He later challenged the sanctions and initiated investment arbitration against Luxembourg in 2024, seeking approximately $16 billion under a bilateral investment treaty dating from 1989 between the Belgium–Luxembourg Economic Union and the Soviet Union.
The EU General Court annulled the acts listing and maintaining Fridman on the sanctions list for the period from 28 February 2022 to 15 March 2023. The court found that the evidence cited by the Council was insufficient to substantiate the relevant criteria for that period. Subsequent listings remained in place and were challenged separately, so the earlier judgment should not be read as a blanket ruling against every later listing.
On 22 September 2026, EU member states agreed to remove Fridman and fellow businessman Alisher Usmanov from the sanctions list while extending restrictions on roughly 3,000 other listed individuals and entities for three years, according to the CEOWORLD report. France pressed for Usmanov’s removal, while Luxembourg sought equivalent treatment for Fridman. The agreement was reached through negotiations requiring unanimity among the EU’s 27 member states for the renewal of the sanctions regime.
Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Luc Frieden presented the government’s position as serving the national interest. Accounts of a closed parliamentary committee meeting on 12 October, cited by CEOWORLD through reporting by the Kyiv Independent, said Frieden connected that interest to the effort to make Fridman’s arbitration disappear, given the scale of the claim relative to Luxembourg’s budget. Those descriptions are attributed accounts of the meeting, not a published transcript or a tribunal finding about the government’s motives.
Fridman’s lawyer, Aaron Bass of Paris firm Kiejman & Marembert, told Paperjam that his client was assessing his legal strategy and acknowledged Luxembourg’s positive role in lifting the sanctions. The report did not establish that Fridman had agreed to abandon his compensation demand. Nor did it identify a settlement that would bring the arbitration to an end.
For Luxembourg, the concrete issue is that the sanctions decision and the financial dispute remain separate. The government helped secure a change in Fridman’s status, but the available reporting does not show that this eliminated the claim. The tribunal has not been reported to have awarded the requested compensation, and the ultimate outcome remains unresolved.
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