Vilnius chef sanctioned because of namesake

Three Europeans - two Lithuanians and a citizen of Finland - said that they were faced with a restriction of banking operations due to namesakes,who appear on the sanctions list of Brussels

The EU sanctions imposed against Russia because of the hostilities in Ukraine have affected some citizens of the EU countries, according to The New York Times. At least three people suffered from the consequences of the restrictions, the full namesakes of the persons involved in the sanctions list (in total, it contains about 1.5 thousand people).

One of them is Sergey Kozlov, a chef from Vilnius. His name and surname coincide with the name of Sergei Kozlov, who has headed the government of the Luhansk People's Republic since 2015; restrictions against it were introduced by the European Union, Australia, Great Britain, Canada and Ukraine.

According to the chef, he had to prove that he was not the Kozlov who was under sanctions. His salary was delayed for several weeks, and in March, when Kozlov tried to make a payment, he learned that his bank account was frozen. According to Kozlov, whose father served in the Soviet army, he "never had any serious problems" before Russia moved troops into Ukraine. “I have Lithuanian citizenship. I was born here,” he stressed.

Another namesake of Sergei Kozlov is a 40-year-old Russian language teacher from Kaunas. Last summer, the Delfi portal reported that he had stopped receiving his salary, and his bank accounts were blocked. According to the NYT, during 2022, banks marked him several times as a "potential international terrorist." Kozlov is still experiencing problems: for example, he could not pay the groomer for a haircut of his dog, a Great Dane, and in March, the teacher failed to transfer money to a colleague. "It's both funny and sad at the same time," he said. The teacher had to provide additional documents to prove his identity. Kozlov's father is Russian, and his mother is Lithuanian; he was born in Kaunas and is a citizen of Lithuania.

Andrey Makarov, a 20-year-old student of a music school from Finland, also got into a difficult situation. He is the namesake of a State Duma deputy from United Russia, who is under sanctions from Brussels. The student said that in February, when he moved from an apartment in Helsinki, the bank blocked his payments. Then he was unable to make a payment through the phone. “Of course, I know that I have a Russian name. But I'm not Russian, I'm Finn. I joined the Finnish army and lived here all my life,” Makarov said. According to the NYT, his great-grandparents moved from Russia to Finland to start a new life; Makarov's grandfather did not teach his son Russian.

Banks tend to apologize for such mistakes, but say their hands are essentially tied. An employee of one of the financial institutions suggested that Makarov think about changing his name, but he rejected the idea: "I'm Andrey Makarov, there's nothing wrong with that."

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As the NYT notes, it is now difficult to say how many EU citizens have faced similar problems. In the US, there is a government hotline to solve them, but there is no such service in the European Union. The European Commission says that the authorities of 27 member countries are dealing with the issue of sanctions.