"We are determined to make the Kremlin pay for this new escalation", announced today in Brussels the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who has responded to the "mock referendums" held in the occupied territories of Ukraine and the call the ranks of 300,000 Russian citizens with the announcement of a new package of sanctions to suffocate their war machine a little more. Among the announced measures, which must now be negotiated and adopted by European governments, is the application of the cap on the price of Russian oil purchased by third countries agreed by the G-7 and new restrictions on bilateral trade that will deprive the Kremlin of income worth 7,000 million euros.
"Russia has taken the Ukraine war to a new level. The sham referendums organized in the occupied territories are an illegal attempt to seize them and change international borders by force. Putin's mobilization and threat to use nuclear weapons are new steps on the path of escalation. We will not accept these simulated referendums or any type of annexation in Ukraine", declared Von der Leyen in a brief appearance before the press accompanied by the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, who announced a further expansion of the list of Russian individuals and entities punished for their support of the war.
To suffocate the Russian economy "a little more", the European Commission proposes to expand the list of products that the EU can buy from Russia and include, among other categories, several "key technologies" that it has not detailed, goods from the aviation sector and chemicals. All this "will further erode the base of the Russian economy and prevent its armed forces from modernizing," says the president of the community executive, who has not yet made public the list of affected products.
The community executive has announced that it will present a legal basis to put into practice the decision of the G-7 countries to put a cap on the price of Russian oil in international markets; Although the EU has adopted an almost total embargo against this product that will come into force shortly, what is intended is that the countries that buy it do not do so above a certain price. "This will reduce Russia's income and keep the energy markets stable," argued Von der Leyen regarding this measure, which has a complex legal framework.
Finally, a total novelty compared to previous rounds of sanctions is the prohibition of EU citizens from sitting on the governing bodies of "Russian state-owned companies", a measure proposed by Germany. Brussels also proposes expanding the list of people sanctioned by the EU, who will see their financial and real estate assets in community territory frozen, in addition to losing access to the Schengen zone, to also include people who are helping to circumvent European sanctions through false exports of EU products to third countries - for example, Turkey - for later sale in Russia. "Sanctions work and do damage, but we must maintain them over time and make sure they are not circumvented," Borrell defended.
