German Federal Supreme Court finds violation of Usmanov's right to judicial protection

According to Die Welt, Germany's highest court of civil jurisdiction found that the refusal to forward the lawsuit to the defendant violated Usmanov's right to judicial protection. The businessman filed a lawsuit with a Hamburg court in December 2023, demanding that the Council of the EU cease disseminating information about him that he considers inaccurate. The judge ordered the documents to be sent to Brussels, but, according to the newspaper, their service was blocked for almost three years; according to its information, the court's president coordinated actions with German government agencies, including the ministries of justice and foreign affairs.

The dispute concerns the wording used by the Council of the EU in 2022 to justify Usmanov's inclusion on the sanctions list, where he was described as an oligarch close to the Kremlin and a proxy of Russian President Vladimir Putin. According to Die Welt, one of the sources for these assertions was a Forbes publication; the Hamburg Regional Court banned the magazine from disseminating these claims, as it failed to provide specific evidence. On September 22, 2026, Usmanov was removed from the EU sanctions list, but some of the allegations remain on official websites, the newspaper notes.

The court did not comment on the legality of the sanctions or the accuracy of the accusations: the ruling concerns solely the obstruction of the consideration of the lawsuit. "Access to justice is a fundamental right, and it does not depend on the foreign policy of the sitting government," said Usmanov's lawyer Joachim Steinhoefel. Die Welt columnist Andreas Rosenfelder believes the decision could set a precedent for more than 3,000 individuals on EU sanctions lists.