By Leo Marchandon, Inti Landauro and Gleb Bryanski
PARIS/MOSCOW, Dec 12 - The administrator of Google's defunct Russian business has obtained a temporary freeze on some 110 million euros ($129 million) of the Alphabet-owned company's assets in France, official orders seen by Reuters show.
The move represents a rare attempt by Russian authorities to use legal channels to target assets of western companies overseas, amid rising tensions over the potential use of seized Russian assets in Europe.
Russia's
central bank is separately suing Brussels-based financial institution Euroclear, which holds many of the frozen Russian assets, in a Moscow court.
The measure against Google France involves shares belonging to Google International and was sought by Google Russia, acting through its court-appointed judicial administrator.
The French bailiff declined to comment. Google, Google Russia's administrator and the French government did not respond to repeated Reuters requests for comment.
The French bailiff's orders show its action is based on three rulings issued between 2024 and 2025 by Moscow arbitration courts, which are regulated by international commercial law.
William Julie, the lawyer representing the liquidator at French law firm WJ Avocats, said that a Russian tribunal had found Google guilty of an illegal dividend payment in 2021 worth around 10 billion roubles ($126 million).
Julie said the Russian liquidator was also pursuing enforcement in Spain, Turkey and South Africa.
Google, whose parent Alphabet has a stock market value of some $3.8 trillion, has faced multiple fines from Moscow, while Google Russia filed for bankruptcy in 2022 when authorities seized its bank account, months after Russia invaded Ukraine.
GOOGLE CAN CHALLENGE TEMPORARY FREEZE
The French bailiff's order creates a temporary freeze and French law requires lawyers to launch formal recognition proceedings within one month or the freeze expires.
Julie said those documents would be filed with the court in the coming days and Google France also notified.
The Paris Judicial Court will then examine whether to grant a formal recognition and enforcement authorisation of the foreign arbitration decisions, Julie said, a process that could take up to a year-and-a-half.
Google can challenge the temporary freeze with the enforcement judge. If a recognition and enforcement authorisation is granted, the frozen funds could be seized to satisfy the arbitration court judgements, Julie added.
(1 euro = 93.0263 roubles)
($1 = 79.2455 roubles)
($1 = 0.8524 euros)
(Reporting by Leo Marchandon in Gdansk, Inti Landauro in Paris and Gleb Bryanski in Moscow; Editing by Adam Jourdan and Alexander Smith)
