On February 27, 2019, US Congress published on its website a bill, submitted by Republicans and Democrats on February 13, providing for the imposition of additional sanctions against Russia. The bill is called “Defending American Security from Kremlin Aggression Act of 2019” (DASKA). As previously reported, the bill proposes a ban on transactions with the new sovereign debt of Russia issued by the Ministry of Finance, the Bank of Russia, the National Wealth Fund, or any financial institution with a maturity of more than 14 days. The ban will take effect 90 days after the entry into force of the law. If the bill is approved, sanctions will be imposed on Russian financial institutions, which, according to the President, in one way or another supported “the intervention of the Russian government in democratic processes and elections in any country outside Russia.” In addition, the document provides for measures against investment in Russian LNG projects outside the country, as well as in the development of crude oil deposits in Russia. Investments worth as much as $ 1 mln (or those that have an aggregate fair market value of $5 mln or more during a 12-month period) may be banned.
On January 27, 2019 OFAC lifted sanctions imposed on En+, Rusal, and EuroSibEnergo. Under the terms of their removal from OFAC’s list, the companies have reduced Oleg Deripaska’s direct and indirect shareholding stake in these companies and severed his control. According to OFAC, “this action ensures that the majority of directors on the En+ and Rusal boards will be independent directors – including U.S. and European persons – who have no business, professional, or family ties to Deripaska or any other SDN, and that independent U.S. persons vote a significant bloc of the shares of En+.” All sanctions on Oleg Deripaska continue in force, sanctions were lifted only on the companies he controlled. This decision became a precedent – before that, no company or individual was excluded from the sanction list by agreement with the US Treasury.
