Sanctions 2025

NETHERLANDS Trends and Developments Contributed by: Sebastiaan Bennink, Sally Eshun, Siqi Zhao and Daniel Webb, Bennink Dunin-Wasowicz

sation requirements under the Directive, while retain - ing the discretion to implement a severity threshold. For example, under current French law – as set out in Article 459 of the Code des douanes (Customs Code) and Article L.574-3 of the Code monétaire et financier (Monetary and Financial Code) – there is no sever - ity threshold excluding certain conduct from criminal liability based on the monetary or economic value involved. Furthermore, Directive No 2025-470 of 28 May 2025, which transposes the Directive into French law, does not adopt the severity threshold option pro - vided under the Directive. Insofar as German law is concerned, most of the vio - lations outlined in the Directive have already been implemented in the Außenwirtschaftsgesetz (Foreign Trade and Payments Act). Nevertheless, a number of amendments are required. This includes implementing the provision of technical assistance, legal services, accounting and tax services in violation of EU sanc - tions as a criminal offence. In addition, circumvention of EU sanctions is now to be regarded as a crime. This also concerns the violation of the best-efforts obliga - tion, which previously was defined as a misdemeanour under German law. Violations with respect to military and dual-use items under paragraph 19 are also to be regarded as criminal offences. The maximum fines to be imposed against legal entities need to be adjusted as well. Pursuant to the Ordnungswidrigkeitengesetz (Act on Regulatory Offences), the maximum is cur - rently set at EUR10 million. According to the Directive, it is up to the German legislation whether to make the fine contingent on the global turnover of the company concerned or whether to set a maximum penalty of EUR40 million. German law, similarly to French law, does not set any severity thresholds for violations of sanctions. As the Directive has not yet been transposed into German law, it remains to be seen whether national legislators there will make use of the severity threshold provision. On 28 April 2025, the Dutch Minister of Justice and Security announced the publication of the implemen - tation of Directive 2024/1226 into Dutch legislation. No substantive changes were needed to implement the Directive into Dutch law.

In brief, the requirement to establish criminal offences for violations of EU sanctions, as set out in the Direc - tive, has already been met by the Dutch Economic Offences Act. Similarly, the definitions in Article 2 of the Directive are already reflected in the Dutch Sanc - tions Act 1977. The Directive does not require member states to replicate these definitions verbatim in their national legislation. According to the Dutch transposition announcement, the Directive’s exemptions from criminal liability for humanitarian assistance – provided in accordance with the principles of impartiality, humanity, neutral - ity and independence – are already incorporated into the Sanctions Act 1977. Similarly, regarding penalties applicable to natural persons, while the Directive man - dates prison terms for violations involving amounts exceeding EUR100,000, Dutch law already provides for imprisonment for sanctions violations, with a maxi - mum sentence of six years’ imprisonment or a fine of up to EUR1,030,000. Meanwhile, for legal entities, the Dutch legislation already included the ability to hold legal persons liable for sanctions violations, as well as providing judges with the possibility to impose certain penalties such as a fine amounting to 10% of annual turnover or the dissolution of the entity, which exceeded the minimum fine of 1% or 5% (depending on the type of violation) of annual turnover set by the Directive. Whilst the Directive provided the option for member states not to criminalise conduct for certain violations involving goods or resources with a maximum value of less than EUR10,000, the Dutch legislation does not include this. Finally, the Dutch limitation period for sanctions vio - lations already far surpasses the five-year minimum required by the Directive, at 12 years. All other arti - cles of the Directive not directly mentioned here were also deemed to be in accordance with existing Dutch legislation. Dutch sanctions enforcement: the Damen investigation In terms of violations of EU sanctions, enforcement has become more prominent in the Netherlands.

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