Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether the decision to grant sanction waivers to licence Mr Prigozhin to pay legal costs was seen in reviewed by (a) Ministers and (b) specialist advisors in his Department.

HM Treasury does not comment on individual licensing cases. We need to carefully balance the right to legal representation - which is a fundamental one - with wider issues.

On the issue of who makes the decision to issue a licence, I refer the Rt Hon Gentleman to the statement I made during my answer to the Urgent Question, which can be found at the following link: https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2023-01-25/debates/54EFDF55-C956-45FC-8500-C47444EAF09F/WagnerGroupSanctionsRegime