EU adds nine to sanctions list over Ukraine

At a Foreign Affairs Council meeting held on 10 December, the EU Council sanctioned nine persons for ‘undermining or threatening the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine’. Those sanctioned were involved in the ‘so called elections’ in the ‘so called Donetsk People’s Republic’ and the ‘so called Luhansk People’s Republic’, both self-declared ‘states’ in Ukraine.

The EU has described these ‘elections’ as ‘illegal and illegitimate’ and has condemned them as in breach of international law, undermining commitments under the Minsk agreements and ‘violating Ukraine’s sovereignty and law’.

Those sanctioned are subject to an EU travel ban and an asset freeze. The sanctions bring the total number of persons listed by the EU under this sanctions regime to 164.

The EU is scheduled to discuss Russia’s recent ‘aggression’ in the Sea of Azov at an EU Council meeting on 13 and 14 December. Tensions escalated on 23 November when Russia captured three Ukrainian vessels and their crew in the Kerch Strait, a narrow waterway to the Sea of Azov between mainland Russia and Crimea.

The President of the EU Council, Donald Tusk, has already indicated that sectoral sanctions targeting Russia’s financial, energy and defence sectors in response to its actions in Ukraine will be rolled over before their expiry on 31 January 2019.

The EU press release can be found here:
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2018/12/10/ukraine-eu-adds-nine-persons-involved-in-elections-in-donetsk-people-s-republic-and-luhansk-people-s-republic-to-sanctions-list/pdf