Despite the EU's ban on direct imports of Russian aluminium, a significant loophole remains: Russian primary aluminium can still be processed in third countries and re-enter the EU market as semi-finished or finished products. This undermines the effectiveness of EU sanctions, sustains Russian export revenues and places additional pressure on European producers that have already moved away from Russian metal. This paper calls for the next EU sanctions package to introduce a targeted and enforceable indirect ban on Russian aluminium to close this loophole and strengthen the integrity of the EU sanctions regime.

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As the Environmental Footprint (EF) methodology becomes increasingly embedded in key EU legislation, including the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation and the Critical Raw Materials Act, the signatories highlight growing concerns over the absence of a robust and operational EF database. This joint letter calls on the European Commission to urgently publish an official methodology for EF-compliant datasets, together with the associated elementary flow list, to ensure consistent modelling, legal certainty and effective implementation across industrial sectors.