The foreign ministers of the European Union (EU) They have agreed to prolong the sanctions imposed on Russia for the invasion of Ukraine confirmed the high EU representative for foreign and security affairs, Kaja Kallas.
The unanimity of the twenty -seven was a necessary step to maintain the restrictive measures that, otherwise, They were going to conclude on January 31.
“The EU Foreign Ministers have just agreed to extend the sanctions to Russia again. This will continue depriving Moscow of income to finance their war”, Said Kallas on social networks, who added that Moscow“ must pay for the Damage that is causing ”.
Kallas presided over a Council of Foreign Community Ministers with Ukraine on the agenda and in which the extension of restrictive measures to Russia was planned will be approved without debate.
Unanimity is necessary in the EU in sanctions policy and, to try to achieve it, the ambassadors of the twenty -seven on Monday were urgently reunited without making progress, so that The decision was in the hands of the ministers, According to several diplomatic sources.
They specified that Hungary has done before his community partners An allegation about energy security and has requested solidarity and guarantees that oil and gas will continue to flow towards its territory, before supplied by Russian fuels.
The Kremlin said that this prolongation of the sanctions of the European Union against Russia for the war in Ukraine “Nothing changes”. According to the spokesman for the Russian presidency, Dmitri Peskov, the measure It does not mean “nothing new”.
“The EU continues to apply sanctions. More and more people understand that it is a double edge weapon. Europeans suffer from these sanctions. We continue to qualify them illegal restrictions that they contradict international law, “he added.
Energy infrastructure, in Diana
On the other hand, Kallas spread in parallel a statement prepared with the European Commission – which read before the ministers – in which he stressed that the energy infrastructure that It supplies member states is a matter of security for the EUand called all third countries to respect that principle.
“The Commission and the EU member states remain fully committed to the continuous support of Ukraine and, in that context, They will help repair, connect and stabilize Ukraine’s energy infrastructurein which Member States such as Hungary and Slovakia have played a crucial role, “Kallas said.
The European Executive He opened the door to integrate Slovakia already Hungary in the dialogue with Ukraine about the gas supply And, in addition, Brussels will ask kyiv guarantees on the maintenance of oil transfers through the Druzhba pipeline.
The Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen asked upon arrival at the Council to extend the restrictive measures against Moscow and stressed that the new US administration of Donald Trump “also sees a massive value in these sanctions and in maintaining the pressure.”
“We want to have peace, but that means we need to have (the Russian president, Vladimir) Putin at the negotiating tableand in order to push it that way, there are two ways: first, help to Ukraine on the battlefield; second, of course, the sanctions They are working, and the Russian economy really does not go very well right now, ”he said.
Restrictive measures include freezing Russian assets in European territory; In fact, the EU is using the extraordinary returns they produce to finance A credit for the reconstruction and defense of Ukraine, as part of an agreement with the G7.
By European, the amount amounts to 18.1 billion euros.
The EU has been maintained since 2014, when Russia took the Ukrainian Peninsula of Crimea and Sevastopol, sanctions to Moscow that is renewing every six months and has been expanding. They include both average against personalities and companies and sector.
The EU is currently already working on what would be the SYSEXT PACK OF SANCTIONS AGAINST RUSSIAwhich hopes to be ready for the third anniversary of the beginning of the large -scale war against Ukraine at the end of February.
