Targeted Sanctions Against Individuals
This presentation will focus on the use of these designations in the EU and UK. It will address the proportionality concerns in targeting family members through a comparative analysis of recent case law from the ECJ and UK Courts.
Proportionality Concerns in Targeting Family Members – A Comparative Analysis between EU and UK Jurisprudence
Speaker: Francesca Finelli, University of Luxembourg
Discussant: Dr Jed Odermatt, City Law School, City St George’s, University of London
Chair: Dr Andrew Wolman, City Law School, City St George’s, University of London
The event is co-organised by the Institute for the Study of European Laws (ISEL) and International Law and Affairs Group (ILAG).
Abstract
Targeted sanctions are sophisticated tools of foreign policy, particularly the freezing of assets of designated individuals and entities, often referred to as listed, “blacklisted" or blocked persons. However, these measures face a major challenge: circumvention.
The restrictions imposed on individuals create strong incentives for evasion, and targets may find creative ways to bypass them. Family members are often used as the simplest way to evade sanctions, in particular through the transfer of assets, luxury goods and properties.
In response, both the European Union and the UK have introduced sanctions targeting family members to prevent the circumvention of asset freezes and ensure the effectiveness of sanctions.
While such family-based designations were traditionally rare, the sanctions against Russia since 2022 have seen a significant rise in their use. Numerous family members of Russian oligarchs have been designated since the beginning of the war in Ukraine.
About the speaker
Francesca Finelli is a Ph.D. candidate in International and EU Law at the University of Luxembourg, under joint supervision with the University of Pisa. She is supervised by Prof. Matthew Happold and Prof. Sara Poli, respectively, in the two universities.
Her research focuses on international economic sanctions, including EU restrictive measures, and she studies how different jurisdictions counter the phenomenon of sanctions evasion.
Specifically, Francesca conducts a comparative analysis of the legal frameworks in the EU, US, and UK, examining their response to circumvention. Special attention is given to circumvention schemes against targeted sanctions in the form of designations and asset freeze measures.
To further her research, Francesca has spent four months in the US (January-May 2024) as a visiting researcher at Georgetown University Law Center in Washington DC, and she is now a visiting researcher at City Law School in London (from September 2024), to delve into the responses of the US and UK jurisdictions.
Francesca was awarded 'Best Doctoral Student of 2023' by the Department of Law in Luxembourg.
Her academic interests include public international law, EU external relations law, the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), and sanctions law.