EU sanctions: When is Russia lobbying not lobbying?

‘Ceci n’est pas une pipe’ is the title of a 1929 painting of a pipe by Belgian surrealist artist René Magritte, causing semantic disorientation.

‘The case of Alisher Usmanov: When will court decisions prompt the lifting of sanctions?’ is the headline of an opinion piece sent to EUobserver by a firm called QuestComm on 14 January, in a test case of what is or isn’t PR, in view of an EU ban on Russian lobbying dating back to June 2022.

“This op-ed by Joachim Nikolaus Steinhöfel, the lawyer of Alisher Usmanov, examines the European Union’s sanctions against the prominent Uzbek-Russian businessman and philanthropist,” QuestComm also said in its précis of the opinion piece (the examination vehemently concluded that the sanctions should be dropped).

When QuestComm first contacted EUobserver to ask about our editorial policy in general, it didn’t mention Usmanov – a billionaire industrialist who was blacklisted by the EU in 2022 on grounds of helping Russia’s war effort.

We asked QuestComm if it was planning to pitch a text to be judged on editorial merit, or if it was seeking “guaranteed publication” of a “paid stakeholder” article.

QuestComm replied: “Our client requires a guaranteed publication.”

When we later saw the draft text, we declined to publish it either way, but asked QuestComm to clarify who its “client” was and who was paying for its services.