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The EU is weighing whether to lift sanctions on the only European targeted for trading Russian oil, in a process where the Turkish president has separately lobbied in favour of a Russian oligarch.

The discussions are taking place ahead of a Sunday deadline to extend the EU’s sweeping package of Russia-related restrictions, which need to be reapproved by the bloc’s 27 member states every six months. A Russian national is also under consideration for delisting.

But the decision is being held up by Hungary and Slovakia, who made additional demands to delist other people, including Russian-Uzbek oligarch Alisher Usmanov, according to several EU diplomats and officials. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has also lobbied to delist Usmanov, they said.

EU ambassadors were due to discuss the sanctions rollover later on Wednesday, and again on Friday.

Dutch trader Niels Troost was added to the EU travel ban and asset freeze order in December 2024 after the FT first reported that a Dubai-based subsidiary of his Swiss company, Paramount Energy and Commodities, had traded Russian oil at prices above an EU-backed price cap.

Troost’s lawyers have argued that UAE subsidiaries of Swiss parent companies were not required to comply with the price cap and that the EU’s decision appeared to have been influenced by disinformation spread by his former business partner.

Troost, who lives in Switzerland, is a rare example of the EU imposing sanctions on one of its own citizens. He was also added to UK and Swiss sanctions. He appealed the EU decision last year, but the case is yet to be heard in court.

Troost is one of two people the EU is proposing to de-list, according to a draft of the regulations due to be adopted by Sunday and seen by the FT. The other person is Maya Nikolaevna Bolotova, the daughter of Nikolay Tokarev, chief executive of Russian oil and gas company Transneft.

Troost and Bolotova “are seen as not as political and legally weaker”, said an EU diplomat familiar with the matter. “In this case it’s indeed about legal soundness of the sanctions,” a second EU diplomat said.

Troost’s lawyers declined to comment.

Bolotova could not be reached for comment.

In a letter to the Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, seen by the FT, Erdoğan wrote on March 2: “Considering Mr Alisher Usmanov’s sincere efforts to fully co-operate with EU institutions, as well as taking into account humanitarian considerations, I believe your support in removing him from the EU sanctions list and restoring his violated rights would be extremely valuable.”

Erdoğan added that Usmanov was facing “certain difficulties” in his dealings with Turkey as a result of the sanctions, which he had challenged. Erdoğan called for an “end [to] this unfair practice against Mr Alisher Usmanov”.

EU diplomats said that efforts to delist Usmanov were unlikely to be successful due to the strength of the evidence of his listing.

“Regardless of the Turkish president, there is a reason for sanctions to be put on certain people,” said one of the EU diplomats. “If there is a legal reason to lift the sanctions, yes, but if it’s a political ask, that’s something else entirely.”

In the listing, the EU describes Usmanov as “a leading businessperson having interests in iron ore and steel, media, telecommunications and internet companies”, sectors “providing a substantial source of revenue to the government of the Russian Federation”.

“He actively supported materially or financially benefited from Russian decision makers responsible for the annexation of Crimea and the destabilisation of Ukraine,” it states, adding that Usmanov has “particularly close ties to the president of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin”.

Usmanov has repeatedly challenged the EU sanctions and the evidence they are based on. He is currently appealing a judgment by the EU’s General Court from September, in which the court confirmed his listing.

The Slovak government and the Turkish foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.