A Swiss court found four executives at Gazprombank's Zurich branch guilty of failing to conduct due diligence before opening bank accounts for Russian cellist and Vladimir Putin associate Sergei Roldugin, the BBC reported. The Zurich District Court ruled that it was clear the millions of Swiss francs held in the accounts from 2014 to 2016 did not belong to Roldugin because he had no income, also finding that the bankers should have asked more about the source of the funds, according to another report by Reuters. The four bankers were fined more than $811,000 in total and suspended for two years.

The first panel under the 11-member Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership was established last week by New Zealand, which is challenging Canadian tariff-rate quotas on dairy. Damien O’Connor, New Zealand's trade minister, said last year the TRQs are "against the rules of the CPTPP" and New Zealand's exporters "are not able to fully benefit from the market access that was negotiated under the agreement." The panel request was made in November.

The U.K. Supreme Court ruled Ukraine can defend a $3 billion Eurobond lawsuit on the grounds it was forced to take on the debt in 2013 due to threats from Russia. The Law Debenture Trust Corp., which is incorporated in England and Wales, sued on Russia's behalf. Ukraine said it need not pay the loan because it was procured by duress stemming from illegal pressure and threats, including sanctions.

The U.K.'s High Court of Justice on March 14 rejected a challenge from Belarus technology company LLC Synesis to its sanctions listing. Justice Robert Jay held that the U.K.'s standard for a listing -- not a finding of fact but "reasonable grounds to suspect" -- is a well-established test under the law. Decision-makers must consider the information "as a whole" and it "cannot be disaggregated or salami-sliced," Jay said. Synesis was listed for supplying the Belarus state with video surveillance and monitoring systems that could be used to suppress protesters.

The EU General Court on March 8 annulled the listing of Nizar Assaad under the Syria sanctions regime, finding the European Council erred in establishing that he is still a businessperson in Syria, has any ties to the ruling Assad or Makhlouf families or is associated with the Syrian regime. The court also said the council violated the principle of legal certainty by retroactively imposing the sanctions in 2011 after confirming that Assaad was not the listed party for the previous 10 years.

The EU General Court in a March 1 opinion granted "interim measures" allowing Russian national Nikita Mazepin, sanctioned in September, to enter the EU to "negotiate his recruitment" as a Formula 1 driver racing under a neutral flag. The opinion marks the first time the court suspended sanctions on a person pending the main hearing of the case, according to the European Sanctions blog.

Shipping giant A.P. Moller-Maersk is seeking around $43 million from Evergreen Marine over its Ever Given container ship's blockage of the Suez Canal in 2021, ShippingWatch reported. Filing suit at Denmark's Maritime and Commercial Court over losses caused by the Ever Given, Maersk said the blockage forced the company to divert vessels and suffer delays of shipping lines. Evergreen denied liability for the damages, ShippingWatch reported.

The EU General Court recently rejected a claim from former Ukrainian Minister of Revenues and Duties Oleksandr Klymenko looking for over $53,000 in reputational damages and over $2.1 million -- plus around $536 a month -- in damages stemming from his sanctions listing, according to an unofficial translation. Klymenko was listed under the EU's Ukraine misappropriation of state funds regime from 2015 to 2021.

The U.K. Commercial Court released a judgment in a case concerning vessels financed by the Russian transport ministry. The proceeding deals with a Cypriot charterer, Garvelor, which claimed specific performance of obligations it was owed under a bareboat charterparty by the vessel owners -- subsidiaries of sanctioned company GTLK. The subsidiaries provided for Gravelor to make payments for the vessels and for the title of the vessels to be transferred to them when the charterparty was terminated. However, sanctions made it illegal for Gravelor to pay the subsidiaries in U.S. dollars, which the charterparties required. The Commercial Court held that tendering payment in euros to a frozen account filled the contractual obligation to pay, granting an order to transfer the title of the vessels to Gravelor after considering the sanctions impact.

The U.K.'s Commercial Court in a Jan. 27 judgment let a proceeding involving PJSC National Bank Trust and PJSC Bank Otkritie Financial Corp. be taken to the Court of Appeal, finding it raises key questions of law concerning the impact of the U.K.'s Russia sanctions on ongoing litigation involving a designated party.