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Putin’s Daughters Risk E.U. Sanctions Amid Ukraine Outrage

The European Union is discussing sanctioning Russian President Vladimir Putin’s daughters, according to people familiar with the matter, as the continent tries to respond to the killing of Ukrainian civilians by retreating Russian soldiers.

Although the proposed list needs to be approved and changed by European governments, it also contains dozens of individuals including political figures and tycoons, their families, as well as propagandists.

Sanctioning Putin’s daughters, Katerina and Maria, is largely a symbolic move since it’s unclear they have significant assets outside of Russia, but it’s designed to get the president’s attention. His daughters’ lives are shrouded in secrecy, they have different maiden names and the Kremlin has never confirmed the names of his daughters or released photographs of them as adults.

Putin revealed a few facts about his daughters in 2015: They both graduated from Russian universities, and they speak many languages.

Maria Vorontsova, his older daughter, is a co-owner of Nomenko, which is involved in Russia’s largely private investment project in health care, according to the people familiar with the matter. Katerina Tikhonova is the director of an artificial intelligence center at Moscow State University.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said by text message that he wasn’t aware of the proposal and would wait to see what is published officially.

The E.U. is also planning to target more than a dozen entities in the defense sector and four banks that had been cut off from the global payments system SWIFT but hadn’t yet been fully sanctioned, including VTB Bank PJSC. It’s also proposing a ban on Russian coal imports.

All 27 E.U. members must approve the sanctions package. members.

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