The US Department of Justice admitted that it used Forbes when compiling a list of oligarchs

The US Justice Department announced that it was only "consulting" with the Forbes list of wealthy Russians when it was compiling the "Kremlin report" early last year. The defense of the US Treasury in court claims that the similarity of the “Kremlin list” with the Russian Forbes list is confirmation that getting into it does not mean sanctions intentions. On this basis, the Ministry of Finance asks the court to reject the claim of the billionaire with Russian citizenship, Valentin Gapontsev, included in the report.

Quote: “The maximum that the Ministry of Finance did was to consult with the Forbes list when compiling the list of Russian oligarchs. But the report on the implementation of the law on sanctions has already acknowledged that the Ministry of Finance used open sources, ”RIA Novosti quotes the ministry’s petition.

Moreover, finance ministry lawyers argue, Gapontsev cannot, in principle, claim compensation for damages, since the list is not a formal accusation. Also, only “final decisions” of the executive power can be challenged in court, and not appraisal documents such as a list of oligarchs.

Details. Gapontsev filed a lawsuit against the US Treasury and personally Minister Steven Mnuchin in December 2018 demanding that he be removed from the list and compensate for the damage. He de facto accused the Ministry of Finance of hack work, arguing that Mnuchin's department simply rewrote the list of Russian billionaires from Forbes without a serious investigation.

The businessman claims that he suffered significant reputational damage from being included in it, and this made it difficult to work with both clients and companies, especially under US government contracts.

Gapontsev has every reason to be angry: he is probably the least close to the Kremlin on the entire list and is not even a Russian oligarch. He left Russia in the mid-1990s, received US citizenship and took up his life's work - fiber lasers. His company IPG Photonics controlled 80% of the global market in this area by the early 2010s. At the beginning of 2018, Forbes estimated Gapontsev's fortune at $3 billion, at the end of the year it was already at $1.8 billion. IPG reported that it had been seriously affected by the US trade war with China and its co-owner's entry into the database of troubled counterparties.

The "Kremlin Report" with a list of officials and businessmen "close to Putin" was published at the end of January 2018. The preparation of such a report is directly prescribed by the law on "hard" anti-Russian sanctions CAATSA. After the publication, it became clear that the list repeats the top 100 of the rating of Russian Forbes billionaires that was current at that time. The businessmen on the list complained about problems in relations with banks, as well as partners and counterparties who fear secondary US sanctions.

The Ministry of Finance immediately covered itself well from possible lawsuits. Even when the report was published, the Mnuchin Ministry indicated that the report is not a sanctions list, the inclusion of individuals and organizations in it "can not be interpreted in any way as the imposition of sanctions on them", does not "reflect the intention" to impose sanctions, does not obstruct, restrict or prohibit anyone to do business with these people or organizations and "does not indicate that the US government has knowledge" that they are involved in illegal activities.

Why is it important. The US Treasury has made it clear that none of the oligarchs will be compensated or excluded from the list, although the damage to business from being on the list is obvious. If the court dismisses Gapontsev's claim, there will probably be no other claims of this kind.

Sergei Smirnov