Europe Lifts Sanctions On Yandex Cofounder Arkady Volozh (wired.com) 44
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Arkady Volozh, the billionaire cofounder of Russia's biggest internet company, was removed from the EU sanctions list today, clearing the way for his return to the world of international tech. On Tuesday a spokesperson for the European Council confirmed to WIRED that the Yandex cofounder was among three people whose sanctions were lifted this week. Volozh, 60, was initially included on the EU sanctions list in June 2023, following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. "Volozh is a leading businessperson involved in economic sectors providing a substantial source of revenue to the Government of the Russian Federation," the blocsaidlast year to justify its decision. "As founder and CEO of Yandex, he is supporting, materially or financially, the Government of the Russian Federation." In response, Volozh stepped down from his position as Yandex CEO, calling the sanctions "misguided." [...]
The removal of sanctions affecting one of Russian tech's most prominent figures will be especially significant if Volozh goes on to build Yandex 2.0 inside Europe. The billionaire maintains strong ties to exiled Russian tech talent, with thousands of Yandex staff leaving the country after the start of the war. "These people are now out, and in a position to start something new, continuing to drive technological innovation," Volozh said in the same 2023 statement. "They will be a tremendous asset to the countries in which they land." Yandex is widely known as "Russia's Google" because it monopolizes the Russian search market and offers many other services, including Yandex Music for streaming, Yandex Navigator for maps, and Yandex Go for hailing a ride. "Over the past 18 months, [Dutch-based Yandex NV] has been involved in complex negotiations with the Kremlin, in an attempt to sell its Russian operations while carving out four Europe-based units, which include businesses focused on self-driving cars, cloud computing, data labeling, and education tech," reports Wired.
Last month, Yandex NV reached a "binding agreement" to sell its operations in the country for $5.2 billion -- a price that reflects a 50% discount that Moscow imposes on companies from "unfriendly" countries like the Netherlands as a condition of exiting business in Russia.
The removal of sanctions affecting one of Russian tech's most prominent figures will be especially significant if Volozh goes on to build Yandex 2.0 inside Europe. The billionaire maintains strong ties to exiled Russian tech talent, with thousands of Yandex staff leaving the country after the start of the war. "These people are now out, and in a position to start something new, continuing to drive technological innovation," Volozh said in the same 2023 statement. "They will be a tremendous asset to the countries in which they land." Yandex is widely known as "Russia's Google" because it monopolizes the Russian search market and offers many other services, including Yandex Music for streaming, Yandex Navigator for maps, and Yandex Go for hailing a ride. "Over the past 18 months, [Dutch-based Yandex NV] has been involved in complex negotiations with the Kremlin, in an attempt to sell its Russian operations while carving out four Europe-based units, which include businesses focused on self-driving cars, cloud computing, data labeling, and education tech," reports Wired.
Last month, Yandex NV reached a "binding agreement" to sell its operations in the country for $5.2 billion -- a price that reflects a 50% discount that Moscow imposes on companies from "unfriendly" countries like the Netherlands as a condition of exiting business in Russia.
Re:Finally some semblance of sanity (Score:4, Interesting)
Help Ukraine? If Europe hadn't stepped up there wouldn't be a Ukraine right now. Putin has openly stated Ukraine isn't a country [businessinsider.com] and pulled out an old map [businessinsider.com] to prove it. Right now he's working to annul the 1954 return of Crimea to Ukraine [reuters.com].
As for staying with Putin, there seems to be an epidemic of people who stuck with him falling [newsweek.com] out of windows [independent.co.uk].
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Help Ukraine? If Europe hadn't stepped up there wouldn't be a Ukraine right now.
WTF? I'm not saying that Europe and the US are doing nothing. I'm saying that EU's policy towards Russian sanctions has been an utter failure. It _strenghtened_ Putin instead of hindering him.
As for staying with Putin, there seems to be an epidemic of people who stuck with him falling out of windows.
Exactly. People in Russia can't oppose Putin because most people are stuck there. There are no easy ways to get out of Putin's reach, so they grudgingly continue working for the regime.
Re:Finally some semblance of sanity (Score:5, Interesting)
Well... no.
The sanctions hurt Putin in way more ways than you can imagine. First, Russia has a fairly one-dimensional economy. Almost all its exports are oil and gas [oec.world]. Over 60% of their exports are primary energy forms (i.e. Oil, gas, coal), mostly unprocessed, some processed. The rest is mostly mining products and then, well, that's pretty much it. Until 2022, most of that went to the West for pretty good money.
That changed considerably since. Right now, the numbers you see in the link are no longer the case, most of Europe's imports have ceased. China is the only country that can compensate at the level required, and of course China, having Russia by the balls now, sets the price.
So those sanctions hit right where they hurt the most: His war purse.
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So those sanctions hit right where they hurt the most: His war purse.
no they don't: https://www.energypolicy.colum... [columbia.edu]
russia may sell cheaper now but they make up for it selling quite a bit more, and they have reserves enough to do that for a very long time.
you are repeating the same kind of wishful thinking that brought about this war to begin with. it comes from way, way back. do you recognize this man?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
first they thought they could shove this nato expansion down their throat. it was wishful thinking because russia warned clearly and repeated
Re:Finally some semblance of sanity (Score:4)
You can only export as long as someone is importing. China and India are reaching the saturation point and, well, that's pretty much who Russia is exporting to. At this point, Xi has Putin pretty much by the balls to do his bidding so he keeps buying the oil he doesn't need. If Putin as much as dares to say "but", Xi will start squeezing.
As far as NATO expansion goes... NATO doesn't expand per se. It's a pretty exclusive club that doesn't exactly advertise. It considers applications. Ukraine applied, NATO pondered accepting it. After Russia invaded Ukraine, Finland and Sweden applied.
By the way, are you sure Putin isn't a Western mole? That guy single handedly crippled Russia and made the Russian border with NATO like twice as long.
The thing is, we got Russia already where we wanted it. Beaten up, broken, economically bankrupt and done for. The best part was, we didn't even have to risk a single life for it. AND we managed to sell the weapons we almost had to scrap because they were reaching their end of life. Instead we could dump them on Ukraine and make them pay for it. For years to come.
Seriously, are you sure Putin isn't a Western mole?
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The thing is, we got Russia already where we wanted it. Beaten up, broken, economically bankrupt and done for. The best part was, we didn't even have to risk a single life for it.
well, at least you moved on from the russian imperialism story!
then again, i don't know what your sources are but russia is far from bankrupt. i'm afraid this is again wishful thinking.
AND we managed to sell the weapons we almost had to scrap because they were reaching their end of life. Instead we could dump them on Ukraine and make them pay for it. For years to come.
that's indeed true. and not just that, also pass it publicly as "humanitarian aid", when it's just yet another money transfer from public coffers to private hands.
Seriously, are you sure Putin isn't a Western mole?
no, i don't think so. first i don't think your illusions of russia being really harmed by this are based on reality, i'd say they are holding out spectacularly well
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I didn't move on from Russian imperialism, I didn't even go there. Because it's moot. Whether Russia wants to expand or not is just as important as whether a Chihuahua wants to bite me. If it can't do that without getting kicked into next week, it doesn't matter whether they want to or not.
The Russian economy is woefully one-dimensional. And fragile. The key problem is that Russia did (almost) what Germany did up to WW2, deficit spending on a criminal level, until it was basically bankrupt. The idea was now
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I didn't even go there. Because it's moot. (...) just as important as whether a Chihuahua wants to bite me
indeed, russia never had remotely the capacity even if they wanted to, which made that propaganda theme (and how it was mindlessly picked up by 100% of western media) even more obnoxious imo.
it turned the neutral states in Europe into NATO members
well, chihuahuas ... :-D my argument is that russia had no immediate interest in these states to begin with, and although they surely don't welcome this development, it probably harms europe as a whole more than russia in particular, they are in defense overdrive anyway. i'm not saying these states were foolish to join
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Russia may not have some immediate interest, but Sweden and Finland joining NATO turned Kaliningrad from a dagger at the throat of the West into a liability. The Baltic Sea pretty much turned into NATO sea now, with Kaliningrad becoming de facto untenable if Russia should decide to get cocky with NATO.
Until Finland became a NATO member, Kaliningrad was a front base for any kind of attack against NATO. It was trivial to supply via the sea, and it could have served as a convenient way to cut off any reinforce
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kaliningrad was pretty much compromised when the baltic states joined nato, russia tried vehemently to oppose that too but was far too weak to do anything about it. that's something they have to live with now.
the finnish border is indeed another story, but that cuts both ways. now finland will be on the frontline if trouble escalates between nato and russia, which is why russia already said they will be amassing units there. that escalation could happen far away, say for example in ukraine if nato involveme
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Kaliningrad was a problem for NATO when the Baltic states joined. Because it would have become very complicated to keep them supplied. It would have been trivial for Russia to cut off the Baltic states from Poland, the corridor there is only a few miles wide and denying this (at least, if not occupying it) would have been quite easy for Russia. Supplying the Baltics would have become a logistical nightmare since the Baltic Sea was anything but secure for NATO. Kaliningrad was a 365 day ice- free harbor into
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possibly. i really hadn't looked at that region too closely, thanks for pointing that out. on a more general level, you tend to favor to point out how and where russia might be in trouble. russia no doubt has lots of troubles and fires to tend to. i would like to reiterate that i'm not defending or even endorsing russian positions, nor am i particularly vested in russian success or even survival. but for me russia is just as rational an actor as anyone else, i can see where their motivations come from, and
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Russia's reason for attacking Ukraine are based on a mix of wrong assumptions and fears. The idea was simple: Come in a swift surprise coup, decapitate the country, kill Zelenskyy, install a puppet and have a press conference where they announce the new facts on March 2nd. The PC was even already assigned and called in. It was called off on the 1st after the whole thing went south.
The reason for the operation going bad was threefold (aside of things I won't discuss right now). First, Putin believed his own
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that's not even a bad description of events. of course russia probably wouldn't want to kill zelensky outright, just depose him, but we know these things can get easily south. yanukovich's car got shot at while he was fleeing for his life (although he denied to be fleeing) when he was deposed by the coup.
and what you got fundamentally wrong, i think, is russia's fear. for one, it doesn't even really matter what you or me think, what matters is what they think, and the fact that they're definitely not a chih
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The plan was pretty solidly to get rid of him for good.
As far as Russia's "fear" goes, and as far as US "encroachment" goes... last I checked, the US didn't have to invade any country to make them want to join NATO. If anything, the urge to enter NATO is based on their fear of Russia rather than a lot of pressure from across the pond. Sweden and Finland have both stayed outside of NATO for over 70 years and relied on their neutral status, only to now realize that neutrality means jack shit to Russia.
You don
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The plan was pretty solidly to get rid of him for good.
and the solid evidence for that would be?
As far as Russia's "fear" goes, and as far as US "encroachment" goes... last I checked, the US didn't have to invade any country to make them want to join NATO.
nope, the us uses other means you might find more civilized and ethical but have ended up in war just the same. if us elites hadn't meddled to push for ukraine's incorporation into the western sphere of influence, ukraine would still be a peaceful country today, they probably wouldn't have had a civil war, they would still hold crimea and wouldn't have suffered the ordeal of an invasion and getting wrecked. then again i'm not seeking any moral ground here, just obser
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Let's be clear what we're talking about here. The original CEO, Elena Bunina, stepped down in protest of the war [capacitymedia.com] around April 1 2022 and was apparently replaced by Volozh who then also stepped down right after he was sanctioned. [reuters.com]
But that was 21 months ago. Which is a big problem if you think sanctions should encourage people to act against the Putin regime. Anyone else who was sanctioned, and who was thinking about whether to stop playing the role or actions for which they were sanctioned, would've looked
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The sanctions hurt Putin in way more ways than you can imagine. First, Russia has a fairly one-dimensional economy. Almost all its exports are oil and gas . Over 60% of their exports are primary energy forms (i.e. Oil, gas, coal), mostly unprocessed, some processed. The rest is mostly mining products and then, well, that's pretty much it. Until 2022, most of that went to the West for pretty good money.
Russia is still exporting oil and a bit of LNG for about 80% of the pre-war dollar amount in total. That 20% was a blow to the economy, but Russia has enough reserves to last for 1-2 more years without significant cuts in internal spending.
But that's not all. The main issue is that the life inside Russia is... mostly normal. Sure, some Western companies moved out, but they left behind people with all the expertise in running them. So these people quickly organized themselves and replicated the business mo
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They did covet the name, though, and Peter I renamed his country thus in 1721, after conquering a swatch of Ukrainian lands.
Gah. That's about as incorrect as it can be. Russia referred to itself as "Russia" since around mid-15-th century. For example, the official title of Ivan III (the predecessor of Ivan The Terrible) started with "By the Grace of God, the Tsar and Sovereign of all Russia and the Grand Prince of Vladimir, Moscow, Novgorod....".
Some documents, especially in Latin, kept referring to Russia as "Moscovia" until the end of Latin language in diplomacy. But that's it.
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Most of kings claimed titles all around the world, including often even stars and the moon. This doesn't mean anyone seriously regarded the name "Russia" as meaning anything other than Ukraine before 1721.
There's a hoax campaign going on Wikipedia and such, but it hasn't really started since circa 2014.
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This doesn't mean anyone seriously regarded the name "Russia" as meaning anything other than Ukraine before 1721.
This is pure nonsense. Russia had multiple treaties with Western and Eastern countries way before 1721. And it was referred to in these treaties as "Russia". Heck, England established a joint enterprise with Russia in 1555 (see: "Muscovy Company"). You can read about its founding in the book "Of the Russe Commonwealth" by Fletcher Giles, written in 1591.
No sanity in Europe (Score:1)
Help Ukraine? If Europe hadn't stepped up there wouldn't be a Ukraine right now.
NATO membership requires each country to spend 2% of its GDP on defense. There are currently 32 NATO member countries, and of these only 11 are meeting this goal.
In particular Germany and France, which are #1 and #3 in Europe by GDP (UK being #2) spend less than the requires 2%.
Right now the European countries are scrambling to give weapons and armor to Ukraine. Germany is ramping up production of armaments, but will be missing it's target production by about half [newsweek.com] this year.
If Europe had kept to its NATO ob
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>NATO membership requires each country to spend 2% of its GDP on defense.
Sadly it does not. The agreement reached is non-binding, nor does membership depend on meeting these numbers.
>Right now the European countries are scrambling to give weapons and armor to Ukraine.
Not really. Some are, some aren't. For example, Czech "found" artillery shells? Guess where they're from. Hint: a slavic nation with significant friendly ties to Russia that is one of the biggest if not the biggest arms producers of Sovie
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Jews are massively overrepresented in Russian national elites, courtesy of not being nearly fully purged by Nazi Germany like they were in much of Central and Eastern Europe. Absolutely hilarious amount of elites in Russia have dual citizenship, and those that don't have relatives there anyway. The old joke was that at the start of the war, half of the Russian elites left for Tel Aviv, and those that couldn't left for Dubai. Elites in any nation have minimal if any loyalty by default, because their resource
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I'm fairly sure that abandoning Putin and turning your back on him works wonders for your wallet.
Though you will have a hard time spending your money in the Gulag you'll be sent to.
Google sucks so bad (Score:2)
I use Yandex these days.
Taking bets..... (Score:3)
Taking bets on how long before Volozh's defenestration.
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Sure. Considering Durov is just fine, how much money are you looking to give away, and in what time frame?
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Sure. Considering Durov is just fine, how much money are you looking to give away, and in what time frame?
Billionaires can afford great personal security. Simpler people like Volozh get the hammer.
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This "simple person" who is the opposite of a billionaire is getting 5,2 billion USD from the sale of Yandex alone according to the story That's before counting any of his other assets.
Can you explain how you arrived at the conclusion that person who's getting 5,2 billion for a sale (before counting any of his other assets) is not a billionaire and instead a "simple person who can't afford security"?
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Sarcasm much, chud-boi? Or does IRA pay you like a column writer, by the word?
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We're all clapping.
Russia and Israel are doing it wrong. (Score:1)
What we need is not countries taking law into their own hands.
Instead. Russia and Israel should work to make a better law-heeding world for every country.
Both are intelligent countries. We should use reason and not violence.
Re: Russia and Israel are doing it wrong. (Score:3)
Reason wonâ(TM)t stop Russian violence. Putin wonâ(TM)t stop until heâ(TM)s achieved his goals. Trying to reason with him will only reward him with the territory heâ(TM)s taken from other countries. Itâ(TM)s no better than reasoning with Hitler in Munich in September 1938.
Re:Russia and Israel are doing it wrong. (Score:4, Interesting)
Can't do that.
Russia's main problem is its corruption. Putin's power is propped up by his cronies. And they will only continue to prop him up as long as he keeps allowing them to fleece the country.
And then Ukraine started to show them up.
Ukraine and Russia had the same initial condition after the fall of the Soviet Union. Both were members, both had a similar situation, both had crippling corruption, both were run by the mafia right after the fall of the SU. The difference is that Ukraine finally had a president that decided to end corruption and turn towards the West. And the West started to pump money into Ukraine because of that.
And this in turn meant that prosperity grew in Ukraine. Especially after they got rid of the Russian puppet in 2014, average wages more than doubled [intellinews.com] within 5 years.
Now imagine you're a Russian and you see that your life goes nowhere, in a country that you know (because you're always told so) has the biggest and greatest energy reserves in the world, a country that has all the resources everyone wants and that can output a lot of economic power... yet you still have nothing and you also don't see any improvement.
Russia had to attack Ukraine. If only so its population doesn't have a shopping window into a more prosperous country with fewer resources anymore. Because people would have started to wonder how that's possible.
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I have a feeling that the prospect of Ukraine joining the EU was more threatening to Putin, but blaming NATO is an easier story to sell.
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Ukraine joining the EU is a bigger threat to Putin even than Ukraine joining NATO.
NATO is a defensive pact. And no matter how Putin wants to spin it, by its very nature, NATO cannot attack anyone. It's not in the cards. If Poland, a NATO member, decided to attack Russia, they're on their own. Nobody in NATO would come to their aid.
But Ukraine joining EU would be devastating.
Russia and Ukraine share a lot of common history. Almost a century of common history. Until 1990, they were essentially one country, un
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Nobody. Sanctions doesn't mean anyone is arrested, or that anyone else in the world need to give a shit. Sanctions are only related to activities involving the country that has put sanctions on someone or some place.
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Trump. He pretty much said that the US won't do it anymore, someone had to step in when he decided he wants to drop the ball as soon as he's in power.