Businessman Oleg Tinkov appealed to the British Foreign Office to ask them to lift the sanctions. On this subject writing Bloomberg, citing the banker’s statement.
In the appeal quoted by the agency, Tinkov said he agreed with the British authorities’ decision to impose sanctions “against people who support (Russian President Vladimir) Putin or contribute to the war”. At the same time, as the businessman notes, “it’s sad that they mistakenly thought I was one of those people.”
“Removing sanctions from me would be a fair (decision) and would send a signal that Western sanctions are not targeting all Russians, but only those who support Putin and his invasion,” Tinkov said in a statement quoted by the agency.
Russian businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky also wrote a letter to the British Foreign Office with a request to lift Tinkov from sanctions. In an interview with Bloomberg, he noted that he viewed the decision to impose sanctions on the banker as “wrong.”
The UK Foreign Office did not respond to the agency’s request and noted that it does not comment on the sanctions that have been imposed on individuals. The Foreign Office also added that “any sanctioned individual or entity has the right to challenge their appointment, and there is a clear legal way to do so.”
Oleg Tinkov was subject to British sanctions in March 2022. At the same time, the businessman criticizes the military conflict between Russia and Ukraine. At the end of April, Tinkov announced that he had sold his family’s stake in TCS Groups, the parent company of Tinkoff Bank, to Vladimir Potanin’s Interros.
According to Tinkov, he was forced to sell his stake in the bank “for a penny” after posting an anti-war message on social media and criticizing events in Ukraine. As the businessman noted, representatives of the presidential administration contacted him and threatened to nationalize the bank if Tinkov did not sever ties with him.
In May 2022, in an interview with journalist Yuri Dudyu*, Tinkov called Britain’s imposition of sanctions against him a mistake.
“My opinion is this: the UK government made a big mistake in presenting me (under sanctions). And like my lawyers said, you’ll be the first person most likely to be kicked out of there if that happens to the Russians. This is clearly a technical error, it seems to me that they took the financial sector, and I have a big name, and I haven’t been to Russia for three years,” he said.
The businessman called his entry into the UK blacklist a “bureaucratic stampede”. “But I’m sure they’ll find out. A year or two or three will pass and they will always get me out of this,” Tinkov said.
At the end of October 2022, the businessman announced his renunciation of Russian citizenship.
Tinkov is not the first Russian businessman to oppose his inclusion on the sanctions lists. In particular, former Alfa-Bank board members Petr Aven and Mikhail Fridman, as well as billionaire Roman Abramovich, decided to challenge the sanctions earlier.
*recognized as a foreign agent in Russia
