DW: EU Preparing New Sanctions Against Russia

What is their essence?

The European Union is discussing a separate regime of sanctions against Russia, which is rapidly increasing revenues. The initiators of creating this regime are the Baltic States, Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania, Finland and Sweden. This is reported by Deutsche Welle with reference to a number of sources in the EU.

According to the document available to DW, there are good reasons for the introduction of a sanctions regime against Russia by analogy with other sanctions against the regimes of such countries as Belarus, Iran, North Korea and Venezuela.

It is noted that a separate sanctions regime is designed to provide a legal basis for punishing those responsible for the deterioration of the situation inside the country.

"The criteria for putting on the list should cover the deterioration of the human rights situation, politicised judicial system and repression of civil society, including actions that undermine democracy and the rule of law," the document says.

Thus, it is proposed to impose sanctions against representatives of "Russia's repressive state apparatus, including those involved in politically motivated court decisions against representatives of civil society and democratic opposition and their further detention, such as responsible persons in the judicial system (prosecutors, courts, penitentiary institutions)."

According to journalists, EU high representative Josep Borrell hopes for a separate sanctions regime against Russia to be approved soon. The proposal was handed over to the EU foreign policy service on February 28. Borrell said, speaking in the European Parliament on April 10, that "a new separate sanctions regime against Russia" was being discussed and expressed hope that it would be approved quickly. The decision is expected to be made before the European Parliament elections, which will be held on June 6-9.