Page 25 - bne IntelliNews monthly country report Russia February 2024

enterprise Novatek announced force majeure due to the US sanctions. It is reported that foreign shareholders - French TotalEnergies, Chinese CNPC and CNOOC, and a consortium of Japanese Mitsui and JOGMEC - have frozen their participation in the project. This will prevent Novatek from fulfilling all its contractual obligations but will not stop the supply of gas completely. The Arctic LNG 2 project is crucial to Russia's ambitions to increase LNG production by more than 200% by the end of the decade. Additionally, the Swiss government has decided to join the 12th package of EU sanctions against Russia.
More than €4B in Russian assets have been seized in Germany. As of the beginning of December 2023, the Ministry of Finance of Germany reported that due to Russia's war against Ukraine, Germany has seized about €4.1B in Russian assets. It is noted that these are frozen accounts, economic resources of individual persons, and blocked funds belonging to the Russian Central Bank. At the same time, the German Foreign Ministry notes that the G7 countries have agreed to "make efforts to ensure that the Russian Federation pays for the reconstruction of Ukraine in the long term," for which it was decided to freeze Russian state assets. Also, for this purpose, a register of damages caused during the invasion was also started. Germany will also confiscate more than €720M from the National Settlement Depository held in the German subsidiary of the American bank, JP Morgan. As reported by media earlier, Germany has frozen Russian assets worth €5.32B since the beginning of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, this amount includes the assets of individuals and companies under sanctions, as well as the Central Bank of Russia.
● Domestic Politics
Putin announces he will seek a 5th term as president. Russian President Vladimir Putin has been in power as either president or prime minister since 1999. Constitutional changes signed by the Russian leader in 2021 allowed Putin to run for two more six-year terms, meaning he could stay in power until 2036. It is unclear if other candidates will nominally participate, but Putin's victory is all but assured.
Russian businessman Alexei Nechaev will stand in as President Vladimir Putin’s “liberal” rival during Russia's 2024 presidential race, the independent news outlet Mozhem Obyasnit reported December 5, citing two anonymous sources in the pro-business political party he created nearly four years ago. Nechaev, who owns one of Russia’s leading cosmetics companies Faberlic, stepped into politics when he founded the New People party in the run-up to the 2021 State Duma elections, which saw the party secure 15 seats in the 450-seat lower house of parliament. According to Mozhem Obyasnit, the businessman-turned-politician's role in the 2024 presidential race will be to attract liberal voters to the polls, just as his party has done in other elections in
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