Russian oligarch Moshe Kantor hit with sanctions in the UK over Putin ties

Moshe Kantor, a leading Russian oligarch and leader of Jewish organizations, was hit with sanctions on Wednesday in the United Kingdom. Forbes estimates Kantor to have a net worth of $11 billion.

Kantor, the vice president of the Jewish Leadership Council in London, is a Russian, Israeli and British citizen.

The new sanctions were announced by UK Foreign Secretary Lizz Truss.

“Our latest wave of measures will bring an end to the UK’s imports of Russian energy and sanction yet more individuals and businesses, decimating Putin’s war machine,” Truss said. “Together with our allies, we are showing the Russian elite that they cannot wash their hands of the atrocities committed on Putin’s orders. We will not rest until Ukraine prevails.”

The British government said that Kantor was chosen for sanctions because he is the largest shareholder of the fertilizer company Acron which has “vital strategic significance for the Russian government.”

Truss said that Kantor’s company and others are used by Russian President Vladimir Putin to “prop up his war economy.”

Kantor is President of the European Jewish Congress (EJC) and put together a gathering of world leaders in Jerusalem in January 2020 to attend the Fifth World Holocaust Forum. His battle against antisemitism has won him numerous awards from European heads of state, including the French Officer of the National Order of the Legion of Honor (2014) and the Italian Knight’s Grand Cross of the Order of Merit (2013).