Tag: sanctions evasion

The EU’s latest Russia sanctions package marks a decisive escalation: Brussels is no longer targeting only banks, oil, and oligarchs — it is now attacking Russia’s crypto settlement infrastructure. Russian crypto platforms, ruble-backed tokens, the digital ruble, and A7A5-linked payment rails are being pushed into sanctions quarantine.

Grinex, the Russia‑linked “crypto‑ruble” exchange born from the carcass of sanctioned laundromat Garantex, has halted operations after reporting a 1 billion ruble ($13–14 million) breach and pointing the finger at Western spy agencies. Blockchain traces and sanctions records instead paint Grinex as a central node in an industrial‑scale sanctions‑evasion network built to move dirty Russian money out of the reach of regulators – and this “hack” may be the final extraction, not the first attack.