Today, 16 May 2017, Decree No. 133 of 15 May 2017 was published on the official website of the President of Ukraine, putting into effect the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine of 28 April. The decree extends personal special economic sanctions to a number of well-known Russian IT companies and Ukrainian legal entities associated with them, including Softline Group Ukraine.
Our company, Softline JSC, was founded by Kyiv programmers in 1995. In the early 2000s, we faced hostile actions by a competitor from the Russian Federation, which not only entered the market with dumping prices (forcing us to close a number of business lines) but also seized the domain name softline.ua in a raider-style manner. Unfortunately, attempts to restore justice through the courts were unsuccessful, even though the Softline trademark (TM) is registered precisely by our company (Softline IT LLC, the legal successor of Softline JSC).
We are currently planning to file a claim with the domain name registrar against the Russian company and its subsidiaries, demanding that the domain be returned to us. In light of the sanctions and the war Russia is waging against Ukraine, we believe this would be fair.
According to the decree, the sanctions, imposed for a period of three years, include blocking of assets — a temporary restriction of a person's right to use and dispose of their property; restriction of trade operations; prevention of capital withdrawal from Ukraine; suspension of the fulfilment of economic and financial obligations; restriction or termination of the provision of telecommunication services and of the use of public telecommunication networks.
In addition, they include a ban on public procurement of goods, works and services from the said legal entities; termination of the issuance of permits and licences for the import into or export from Ukraine of currency valuables, and restriction of cash withdrawals with payment cards; a ban on the transfer of technologies and of rights to intellectual property objects.