In Europe, faith in legal façades is wearing thin. EU Advocate General Manuel Campos Sánchez-Bordona has advised an Italian court against unfreezing assets tied to four companies connected with a trust structure linked to Alisher Usmanov. On paper, he had transferred management long before sanctions. In practice, the court will now decide whether that separation is real.
The central argument: depending on jurisdiction and structure, a trust—even when formally handed over—can still be seen as an extension of the beneficiary’s will. And therefore, as their property.
It’s a precedent with wider implications. Usmanov is not alone in the spotlight. Italy’s Lazio Regional Administrative Court is already weighing similar cases involving the assets of Andrey Melnichenko and Alexey Mordashov. At stake is the legal resilience of trusts as a shield under mounting sanctions pressure.
Since 2022, Italy has frozen Russian assets worth € 2.3 billion. A new turn in case law could reshape the landscape of private capital—and the survival strategies it relies on in Europe’s legal arena.