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New EU Sanctions Against Russia To Take Effect

September 11, 2014
by RFE/RL

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy has said new EU sanctions will go into effect on September 12 against Russia for its role in Ukraine's conflict, but held out the prospect the sanctions could be scaled back or repealed.

Van Rompuy said the EU would monitor the peace process in eastern Ukraine to determine before the end of September if changes are merited.

The fresh sanctions tighten restrictions on weapons deal with Russian defense firms.

They also include a ban on financing from EU countries to Russian energy firms like Rosneft, Transneft, and Gazprom Neft.

It also add the names of 24 Russian citizens and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine to the existing sanctions list, targetting them with travel bans and freezing their assets in the EU.

Meanwhile, the Russian ruble fell to a new record low of 37.57 to the dollar.

Russia's Foreign Ministry on September 11 called the sanctions an "unfriendly act" and warned Moscow's retaliation would be 'absolutely proportionate.'

Andrei Belousov, an aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, said Russia has already compiled a list of consumer goods that it will ban from being imported into Russia in response to the EU's sanctions.

The measures were agreed by EU leaders on the sidelines of a NATO summit on September 5 and formally approved in Brussels on September 8.

But publication of the decision was delayed to allow time to assess the implementation of a cease-fire agreement in eastern Ukraine between Kyiv and pro-Russian separatists.

The EU previously has said that sanctions could be suspended if Moscow honors the conditions of the cease-fire and pulls its troops out of Ukrainian territory.

Russia denies accusations by the EU, Kyiv, and NATO that it has sent Russian soldiers and weapons to reinforce separatists who are fighting government forces in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk and Luhansk provinces.

A top NATO official in late August said that Russia had sent more than 1,000 of its soldiers into Ukrainian territory along with tanks, armored personnel carriers, and GRAD missile launchers.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said on September 10 that Russia had withdrawn 70 percent of the troops Kyiv claims were sent into eastern Ukraine, giving hope to peace initiatives proposed along with the shaky cease-fire.

But a NATO official on September 11 said Russia still has at least 1,000 soldiers in eastern Ukraine.

In another potential blow to peace efforts, a separatist leader in Donetsk has told RFE/RL that Poroshenko's offer of "special status" within Ukraine for the breakaway eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk was insufficient.

Aleksandr Karaman, deputy prime minister of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, said on September 9 that the separatist government there has decided that any negotiations with Kyiv must "be based on the principle of the sovereignty of the Donetsk People's Republic."

Poland -- a transit country for Russian natural gas deliveries to other EU countries -- said Russian natural gas deliveries already have dropped by 45 percent since September 8, when Russia's Foreign Ministry threatened an unspecified "reaction" to more sanctions.

Germany and Slovakia also have reported smaller reductions in gas deliveries from Russia.

Russia's state-controlled Gazprom denies that it has reduced supplies.

Meanwhile, in Kyiv, the speaker of Ukraine's parliament announced on September 11 that Poroshenko would submit Ukraine's Association Agreement with the EU to the legislature on September 16.

Speaker Oleksandr Turchynov said the Verkhovna Rada would vote on ratification of the accord "immediately."

With reporting by Reuters, AP, AFP, dpa, and RFE/RL's Moldovan Service

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-eu- russia-sanctions/26578098.html

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New EU Sanctions Against Russia To Take Effect