The Council of the EU disagreed with the EU General Court’s decision to lift sanctions against Nikita Masepin, but the court upholds its ruling
Next partial success for Nikita Masepin on his way back to motorsport. The General Court of the European Union has issued a second order confirming the partial suspension of EU sanctions against the former Formula One driver
In March, the court had lifted some of the sanctions against the Russian racing driver, theoretically allowing Masepin to re-enter the EU and continue his career.
However, the Council of the European Union had not accepted the findings of the president of the court in its first interim order. Instead, the Council extended the sanctions for another term.
In Great Britain, the sanctions against the Russian were also maintained. Masepin had filed a lawsuit against this in the High Court in London, but it was dismissed in June. This means that his assets in Great Britain remain frozen and the entry ban remains in place.
At least the European Union court has now once again ruled in favour of Masepin, who is thus allowed to continue travelling to the EU to qualify for teams and to race in Formula 1 or other series. He is also allowed to receive income related to his racing activities and to negotiate with sponsors.
These measures were taken “to prevent serious and irreparable harm to the athlete”, according to Masepin’s camp. The Council of the European Union had not presented convincing evidence to the contrary.
Masepin’s lawyers say: “The President of the General Court was not convinced that ‘the restrictive measures […] against the applicant are based on a sufficiently solid factual basis’.”
Moreover, he had pointed out that “the applicant is a young sportsman who is in no way involved in the aggression suffered by Ukraine and who does not engage in any activity in economic sectors which constitute a substantial source of income for the Government of the Russian Federation”.
However, Masepin had never publicly distanced himself from the war against Ukraine until now.
Masepin had announced this year that he did not consider his Formula One career to be over yet and wanted to continue trying to find a cockpit. He spent his only season in the premier class in 2021 as Mick Schumacher’s teammate at Haas, where he failed to score any points.
