EU proliferates its sanctions to more Russian, Ukrainian individuals, companies

BRUSSELS, May 13 (Itar-Tass) - EU Council on Monday did a yet another extension of its blacklist of Russian and Ukrainian individuals, who are banned from entering the EU member-states’ territories and whose bank assets - should any of them found in the EU - are subject to freezing. The current blacklist compiled in connection with the Ukrainian crisis features sixty-one people, a third of them Ukrainian nationals who stand in opposition to the incumbent regime in Kiev and are hence accused by the EU of undermining the territorial integrity of the much-troubled former Soviet republic. The sanctions against them will be reviewed in November. The new extension of the list has embraced three Russian officials, four Crimean officials and six Ukrainian supporters of federalization. The new entrees are first deputy chief of the Kremlin administration, Vyacheslav Volodin, the Commander of the Airborne Troops, Gen Vladimir Shamanov, the chairman of the State Duma committee for constitutional legislation, Vladimir Plitin, the acting director of Russia’s Federal Migration Service, Pyotr Yarosh, the acting director of the Federal Migration Service in Sevastopol, Oleg Kozyura, Crimea Prosecutor Natalya Poklonskaya, and the acting prosecutor of Sevastopol, Igor Shevchenko. The Ukrainian section of the still also includes the people’s mayor of Slavyansk, Vyacheslav Ponomaryov, members of leadership of the East-Ukrainian self-defense forces, Igor Blezer and Igor Kakidzyanov, the chairman of the Central Electoral Commission of the Donetsk People’s Republic, Roman Lyagin, the director of the electoral commission of the city of Lugansk, Alexander Malykhin, and the deputy of the Verkhovna Rada, Oleg Tsaryov. At this moment, the EU continues introducing “phase two” sanctions. It has not yet taken a decision on going over to “phase three” - the trade and economic restrictions on selected sectors of the Russian economy. Diplomatic sources say a minimum of ten countries out of the EU’s twenty-eight - Austria, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, and Spain - object to the application of economic sanctions to Moscow. The very notion of “phases” or “levels” in sanctions against Russia appeared in the aftermath of an EU emergency summit that was held March 6. The sanctions of phase one included the cancellation of the Russia-EU summit initially scheduled for June, suspension of the talks on slashing the visas issuance formalities, and suspension of the EU-Russian partnership agreement talks, which had not seen any noticeable progress over the previous two years in the wake of the EU’s inflexible position. Learn more on itar-tass.com