Putin places Japan Tobacco's Russian units under state management
The decree covers four factories, about 4,000 employees and roughly 40% of Russia's cigarette market, held by a state-linked company.
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Thursday placing the Russian operations of Japan Tobacco International under the temporary management of a state-linked holding company, AO Promyshlennye aktivy, Euronews reported. The order covers four factories, in St Petersburg, Rostov-on-Don, the Lipetsk region and the Leningrad region. NHK World reported that four Japanese-owned factories had been put under Russian management.
JTI employs about 4,000 people in Russia and holds roughly 40% of the Russian cigarette market, according to Euronews, making it the country's largest manufacturer. Its Russian range includes the international brands Winston, Camel, LD, Glamour and Sobranie, along with the domestic labels Pyotr I, Russky Stil and Donskoi Tabak.
The company is headquartered in Geneva. It entered the Russian market in 1999 and bought the local producer Donskoi Tabak in 2018, Euronews reported. JT Group has invested $4.6bn in its Russian operations over more than 20 years, according to a company profile updated in November 2025. After Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the company did not leave the country but suspended new investment in Russian production and marketing.
External management allows state-appointed administrators to run a company's Russian assets without the foreign owner's consent or compensation, Euronews reported. Moscow has presented the mechanism as a response to sanctions imposed after the 2022 invasion. Restrictions on companies from states designated "unfriendly" include caps on dividend payments, which keep profits inside Russia, and substantial fees on sales of Russian business assets. Putin said on 1 October that the mechanism also let Russia prepare retaliatory measures against any future nationalisation of Russian assets abroad, while leaving open the possibility of returning control to former owners if conditions improved.
JTI joins other European companies whose Russian assets have been transferred under the same mechanism, among them the Swiss food group Nestlé, the French retailers Auchan and Leroy Merlin, and the German retailer Metro.
Reuters reported the move as placing Japan Tobacco's Russian assets under temporary administration. The Moscow Times reported that the Kremlin had seized JTI's Russian assets. Nikkei Asia said the decree put four Russian subsidiaries under temporary management by a local entity, and described the cigarette maker as likely caught up in a Moscow pressure campaign over sanctions. Euronews linked the seizure to Russia's arrest last month of Yuki Imai, a journalist with the Japanese newspaper Hokkaido Shimbun, on espionage charges. Russia's Foreign Ministry has accused Tokyo of systematically using journalists to gather intelligence inside the country, an accusation Japan rejects. Japan has joined some Western sanctions over the war in Ukraine and disputes Russia's hold on the Chishima Islands in the Pacific.
How the reports differ
Euronews named the holding company that takes over the factories, AO Promyshlennye aktivy, and tied the decree to Russia's arrest last month of a Hokkaido Shimbun journalist on espionage charges; no other outlet in the set made that link. Nikkei Asia framed the move instead as the cigarette maker being "likely caught up in a Moscow pressure campaign over sanctions," and described the order as covering four subsidiaries rather than the market share or workforce. NHK World counted four Japanese factories placed under Russian management, without naming the new operator. Reuters and The Moscow Times used different verbs for the same act, with Reuters saying the assets went into "temporary administration" and The Moscow Times saying the Kremlin "seized" them.
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