Hüseyin Dogru is a journalist. He has been sanctioned by the EU for a couple of months already.

The sanctions prohibit any EU business and people from offering him any resources. His bank accounts are frozen, he has no money, he cannot pay rent, he cannot pay for food, he cannot feed his 2 newborn children.

Is Hüseyin some kind of vicious terrorist ready to jump on you? Not really, he was sanctioned because of wrong-think, literally.

He was propagating ideas that were not in line with what the EU thinks is right.

Unfortunately he was a bit too successful at it, so BAM! Sanctions! No more food for Hüseyin. He is now reduced to begging friends, family, and complete strangers for food.

Regardless of what you think of what Hüseyin did, the truth is that he had not violated any laws and has not been accused of any crime, otherwise, there would have been a court case and a judge would have decided if he was guilty and what punishment he would receive.

That's not how it works with these sanctions, you go straight to the no-more-food-for-you case, and it's all decided by some bureaucrat in a high tower.

It's pretty terrifying lack of any due process, if you ask me.

No need to be working for Al-Qaeda or ISIS, more importantly, no need to prove any of that, they just need to write something as justification in the form, and that's it, you are done for!

Oh, I almost forgot, it does not matter if you are an EU citizen or not, and you don't have any money, so you cannot even pay lawyers to defend your case or try to appeal the decision.

As you see things can go wrong pretty fast in this new world we are living in. And don't think that living in the USA would protect you. Some day you or your favorite TV personality could wake up and find out that you are sanctioned because of another stupid wrong-think offense.

For example, I see you are already participating in the new "organized gang" called Monero Reddit, some abomination trying to challenge the economic foundation of our modern and very democratic societies! And I have proof because you have joined this subreddit!

That's really all that's needed for us all to go to the begging case. And Monero does not even have to be designated a terrorist organization, it's enough for the bureaucrats to say Monero very bad, something, something protecting the children/fighting against terrorism.

Anyway, hypothetically speaking, how would you manage if you were sanctioned like Hüseyin?

I want to write an article about it, for myself, not for distribution to other people (sanctioned or not). This way, I can rest assured that I have a plan for this low probability/high impact scenario. Here are some of my first thoughts:

Short term (survival mode)

get a way for people to know your situation and your xmr address
- put it in your Twitter/X handle
- make a kuno on https://kuno.anne.media/
- ask/demand reporters writing about you to always mention it in their article
beg friends, family and strangers for food and essentials

Mid-term (making money)

save some money to move out of the sanctions area if you are still inside and live somewhere you can earn some money

Long term (new life)

Move to a country that does not enforce sanctions that were not voted by the UN Security Council

Please share any idea or link that could help!

P.S: It goes without saying, obviously this is not a recommendation for sanction evasion, just a thought exercise among 100% law-abiding people, and you should always dutifully respect and follow your local laws and regulations.

Joke: You could also voluntarily genuflect and bow from time to time towards the building of your local overlords in order to show appreciation that you are not yet sanctioned even though you are a potential wrong-thinker.

UPDATES: I have originally posted this in January, since then, things have not improved at all...

In July 2025 he filed annulment action, the court has still not ruled
His lawyer (Alexander Górski) says the "evidence" the EU handed over on request consists exclusively of Doğru's own public social media posts — no financial transactions, no emails, no Russia links. FAZ concedes no evidence has been presented as of June 2026.
In March 2026 the German sanctions-enforcement office (ZfS) froze his wife Lizzie Phelan's bank accounts — the trigger: she took out insurance for the family car after his policy was cancelled.
In May 2026 the bank also froze his pensioner mother's accounts
He now has a total of 3 children to support (2 newborns and 1 newerborn)
He lives off an exempt €506/month allowance; anyone giving him money, food, or "even a bottle of water" risks prosecution — up to 5 years under the EU directive / up to 10 years under German law.
Reporter ohne Grenzen says individual sanctions for disinformation are "risky"; but the German Journalists' Union (DJU/ver.di) declined to call it a press-freedom violation, framing him as "a businessman running a destabilization business-model with Russian support." (no proof at all was provided to support that)
There is a tiny plus side, with a petition at free-dogru.com that passed 8,000+ signatures and the topic is getting a bit more attention in German society.

Meanwhile, the precedent is established and sanctioning EU residents for "wrong-think" with no court case is now being applied to at least two more people (French ex-MEP Aymeric Baud, Swiss-Cameroonian scholar Nathalie Yamb).