The European Court of Justice considered the appeal of Russian billionaire Mikail Gutseriev, whose fortune was estimated by Forbes at $5.8 billion in 2025, and published its decision.
The businessman requested to cancel the decision of the European Court of September 6, 2023, which denied him lifting of EU sanctions.
The European Union imposed sanctions on Mikail Gutseriev in 2021 for supporting President Alexander Lukashenko.
The justifications for the sanctions were:
“[Mikail Gutseriev] is a prominent Russian businessman, with business interests in Belarus in the sectors of energy, potash, hospitality and others. He is a long-time friend of [President Lukashenko (“Lukashenko”)] and thanks to this association has accumulated significant wealth and influence among the political elite in Belarus. “Safmar”, a company controlled by [the appellant], was the only Russian oil firm that carried on supplying oil to [Belarusian] refineries during the energy crisis between Belarus and Russia in early 2020.
[Mikail Gutseriev] also supported [Lukashenko] in disputes with Russia over oil deliveries. [Mikail Gutseriev] owns the “Slavkali” company, which is building Nezhinsky potassium chloride mining and processing plant based on the Starobinsky potash salt deposit near Lyuban. It is the largest investment in Belarus, worth $2 billion. [Lukashenko] promised to rename the town of Lyuban to Gutserievsk in his [honour]…
He [is] also declared to be the owner of a residency, which de facto belongs to [Lukashenko], thus covering him up when journalists started to investigate [Lukashenko’s] assets.”
Having considered Gutseriev’s appeal, the court rejected the businessman’s request. The decision stated, in particular, that the appellant must accurately indicate evidence that is allegedly distorted by the general court and show evaluation errors that led, in the applicant’s opinion, to this distortion. In this case, the applicant failed to provide such information.
