Decree on sanctions against Russian social networks came into effect

On May 17, the decree of the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko on introduction of sanctions against several Russian legal entities, in particular, “Yandex”, Mail.ru, “VKontakte” and “Ondokalssniki” came into effect. The document has been published in “Uriadovyi Kurier”, “Detector Media” reports.

“To put in force the decision of the National Security and Defense Council Ukraine as of April 28, 2017,   “On Imposition of personal special economic and other restrictive measures (sanctions)”. Oversight of implementation of the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine put in force herewith, to vest in the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine”, the document says.

For the context, on May 15, the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko with his decree put in force the NSDC decision “On Imposition of personal special economic and other restrictive measures (sanctions)”, which envisages blocking of access to the Russian social networks “VKontakte” and “Ondokalssniki”, as well as to the online services of “Yandex” and Mail.ru.

In particular, the legal entities “Yandex”, “Yandex  Ukraine”, Mail.ru, “VKontakte” and “Ondokalssniki” are subject to the following sanctions for the period of three years:

- blocking of assets – temporary limitation of the person’s right to manage the property they own;

- limitation of trading activities;

- prevention of transfer of funds beyond the borders of Ukraine;

- suspension of economic and financial obligations;

- limitation or termination of provision of telecommunication services and use of public telecommunication networks;

- prohibition of state procurement of goods, works and services from legal entities-residents of a foreign country, which are owned by the state, and legal entities, a part of whose capital stock is owned by a foreign country, as well as of state procurement from other economic agents, which offer goods, works or services originating from a foreign country, which is subject to the sanctions under this Law;

- annulment or suspension of licenses and other permits, which are prerequisite for performance of certain kinds of activities, in particular, annulment or suspension of effect of special permits for subsoil use;

- suspension of issuance of permits, licenses for import to Ukraine or export from Ukraine of currency assets and limitation of cash withdrawal under payment cards, which were emitted by residents of the foreign country;

- complete or partial prohibition of committing transactions with securities, emitted by persons covered by the sanctions under this Law;

- prohibition of issuance of permits, licenses of the National Bank of Ukraine for investments into a foreign country, depositing currency assets in accounts and deposits on the territory of the foreign country;

- prohibition of transfer of technologies, rights of objects of the intellectual property right;

- prohibition for Internet providers to provide to Internet users services of access to websites on the domains yandex.ru, yandex.ua (including such services as mail, maps, translation service, news, taxi, etc.), as well as “Yandex”’s subsidiary projects auto.ru and kinopoisk.ru, to the websites Mail.ru (www.mail.ru) and social networks “VKontakte” (www.vk.com) and “Ondokalssniki” (www.ok.ru).