A founding father of Russia’s largest expertise firm condemned his nation’s conflict in Ukraine on Thursday, a uncommon step amongst Russian tycoons caught between concern of Western sanctions and retribution at dwelling.

“Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is barbaric, and I am categorically against it,” Arkady Volozh, who till final 12 months ran Yandex, sometimes called Russia’s Google, stated in a press release. “I have to take my share of responsibility for the country’s actions,” he stated, with out providing extra particulars.

Mr. Volozh, who has lived in Israel since 2014, resigned his publish as Yandex’s chief govt officer and left the corporate’s board final 12 months after the European Union positioned him underneath sanctions for “materially or financially” supporting the invasion. Yandex’s news aggregation service had been accused of blocking antiwar content material, a transfer that the corporate defended as compliance with Russia’s more and more draconian data legal guidelines.

His feedback make him solely the second sanctioned Russian businessman to take an unequivocal public place towards the invasion. Last month, following a authorized combat, the British authorities removed the Russian financier Oleg Tinkov, an outspoken critic of Mr. Putin who has renounced his Russian citizenship, from the sanctions blacklist.

Several others, together with billionaires Mikhail Fridman and Oleg Deripaska, have made vital feedback in regards to the conflict, with out overtly condemning Mr. Putin’s coverage.

Mr. Volozh’s assertion additionally comes amid rising debate amongst Russian opponents of the conflict about tips on how to encourage extra members of the nation’s elite to distance themselves from the federal government of President Vladimir V. Putin.

As successive packages of Western sanctions have failed to separate Mr. Putin’s energy base, opposition politicians and antiwar activists have begun to publicly focus on new methods to encourage extra distinguished Russians to talk out towards the invasion. These efforts contain lobbying Western governments to take away sanctions towards those that have taken a transparent place towards the battle.

Yandex bought its news aggregation service quickly after Mr. Volozh was positioned underneath E.U. sanctions. Mr. Volozh had referred to as the sanctions towards him “misguided.”

Over the previous 12 months, Yandex’s Dutch father or mother firm has been trying to split its core Russian companies, which embrace the nation’s dominant web search engine and taxi hailing service, from subsidiaries centered on synthetic intelligence, which it hopes to relocate overseas.

The firm had stated that it expects the deal, which have to be permitted by the Kremlin, to shut by the tip of 2023. It is unclear how Mr. Volozh’s assertion could have an effect on its progress.

Although Mr. Volozh, 59, not has any formal ties to the corporate, he retains 8.5 % of its shares, that are value about $500 million primarily based on their final buying and selling worth in New York. (The Nasdaq inventory change suspended Yandex and different Russian-based shares days after the invasion).

Mr. Volozh’s assertion was greeted with cautious approval by some in Russia’s largely exiled political opposition.

“Does this statement pass as a ‘deed-based confession?’ Of course not,” Leonid Volkov, an in depth ally of jailed Russian opposition chief Aleksei A. Navalny, wrote on the Telegram messaging app. “But here, it is particularly important to support the first, the most difficult step, in the right direction.”

Mr. Navalny’s crew has adopted one of the uncompromising positions towards Russians whom they take into account to be supporting Mr. Putin’s conflict in Ukraine, publishing a listing of seven,000 people whom they consider must be punished financially by international governments.

Oleg Matsnev contributed reporting.