The EU adopted a new wide-ranging package of economic and individual restrictive measures against Russia, three years after Russia began its full-scale invasion and war of aggression against Ukraine.
The package is aimed at key sectors of the Russian economy such as individuals and entities that own or operate vessels of Putin’s shadow fleet; and those supporting or benefitting from Russia’s military and industrial complex.
“For three years now, Russia has relentlessly bombed Ukraine, attempting to steal land that isn’t theirs to take,” said the EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas: “This new round of sanctions not only targets the Russian shadow fleet but those who support the operation of unsafe oil tankers, videogame controllers used to pilot drones, banks used to circumvent our sanctions, and propaganda outlets used to spout lies.”
The 16th package targets systemically important sectors of the Russian economy such as energy, trade, transport, infrastructure, and financial services. It also adds further measures aimed at tackling circumvention. To curb the risk of the EU sanctions being bypassed, certain provisions of the 16th package are now also mirrored in the Belarus sanctions regime. The EU has in addition updated and strengthened its sanctions regimes concerning Crimea and Sevastopol, and the non-government-controlled areas of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.
53 new entities to the list of those directly supporting Russia’s military and industrial complex in its war of aggression against Ukraine. They will be subject to tighter export restrictions concerning dual use goods and technologies, as well as goods and technology which might contribute to the technological enhancement of Russia’s defence and security sector. A third of these entities are Russian while the others are located in third countries, including China, India, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.
Official Journal (legal texts will be available soon)
