Russia sanctions could be renewed by Dec: Tusk

Trump’s tilt toward Moscow worries Kiev

European Council President Donald Tusk said on Thursday that he expected the European Union to agree on a renewal of economic sanctions against Russia before summit of the bloc’s leaders he would chair in mid- December.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko pressed EU leaders on Thursday to hold firm against Russia amid fears that US President- elect Donald Trump may ditch the Western coalition against Moscow.

Poroshenko’s summit with Donald Tusk and Jean- Claude Juncker, the EU’s top officials, was set to focus on political reforms demanded by Brussels in exchange for visa- free travel for Ukraine.

But he was also expected to push them to maintain sanctions against Russia over the annexation of Crimea and the conflict in eastern Ukraine at a time when Trump’s election has thrown US support into doubt.

The EU is set at its next summit in December to discuss a six- month renewal of wide- ranging economic sanctions against Russia that were imposed after Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine in 2014.

But Ukraine now fears it could be left high and dry after Trump suggested earlier this year the US could accept Russia’s annexation of Crimea if it led to improved relations between the two nations, which are bitterly at odds over Syria.

Trump’s election victory has been met with trepidation in Kiev because of the billionaire TV star’s praise of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the two men’s vow to normalize ties after years of tension.

“I think the focus must be on the situation in Donbass ( rebel- held eastern Ukraine), on Russian aggression, on the extension of sanctions,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin told local television ahead of the summit.

“We have to force Russia to implement the Minsk agreement. For that we need our European friends and the representatives of the US,” he added.

The February 2015 Minsk accord was meant to bring an end to the conflict in eastern Ukraine between government forces and pro- Kremlin rebels but low- level fighting goes on.

The West accuses Putin’s Russia of continuing to support the rebels in a conflict which has claimed 10,000 lives in the past two- and- a- half years, a charge the Kremlin denies.