Billionaires Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Fridman lose access to Lithuania for five years

Lithuania barred Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Fridman from entering the country for five years, starting on Friday, Sept. 25, three days after European Union governments agreed to take both men off the bloc's sanctions list.

Latvia and Estonia intend to do the same.

The three Baltic states share borders with Russia or Belarus and have spent four years arguing for tighter sanctions, not looser ones. What they are doing now is enforcing restrictions the bloc as a whole has just abandoned, which is the first open split in the EU's Russia policy since the invasion.

Lithuania decided on it before the EU decision was final. The foreign minister made a submission, the interior minister ruled that both men should be declared persona non grata, and the Migration Department entered their names onto the list as soon as the ruling arrived, according to departmental representative Rokas Pukinskas. The ban can be reviewed and extended when it expires.

There is a limit to what Vilnius can do. A national ban keeps someone out of the country. It cannot restore an asset freeze, because that power sits with the EU, and the EU has just removed it. Whatever Usmanov and Fridman own across the bloc is now unfrozen regardless of what the Baltics think.

The delistings happened because two governments insisted on them.

France asked for Usmanov to be removed, citing national security without explaining what it meant. The Financial Times reported the request may be connected to a possible agreement with Azerbaijan over French citizens held there.

Luxembourg wanted Fridman off the list because he is suing the country. His claim seeks €15 billion in damages over assets frozen under EU sanctions, and diplomats said Luxembourg calculated that its position would be weaker if Usmanov were released and Fridman were not.

Both names were traded for something the bloc wanted more. EU governments agreed last week to extend sanctions on nearly 3,000 individuals and entities for three years, replacing the six-month renewals that handed any single member state a regular chance to block them. Hungary had used that opening repeatedly.

Ukraine called the decision unacceptable.

Usmanov, 73, is the seventh-richest person in Russia at $16.7 billion on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He holds 49% of USM, which controls Metalloinvest, the country's largest iron ore producer, and a stake in the mobile operator MegaFon. Latvia's government describes him as a businessman with ties to Vladimir Putin.

Fridman, 62, is worth about $10 billion and co-founded the group behind Alfa Bank and LetterOne. He moved to London in 2013 after selling his share of the oil producer TNK-BP to the state-controlled Rosneft for $14 billion, and left Britain once he was sanctioned.