EU to renew sanctions on Russia over Ukraine issue

EU leaders will renew economic sanctions against Russia when they meet for a summit this week, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said yesterday.

Maas said he saw no reason to relax the measures imposed on Moscow over its role in the conflict in the eastern Ukraine. The sanctions target whole sectors of the Russian economy, including its valuable oil and gas industries.

France was to host a four-way summit with Russia, Ukraine and Germany yesterday in the hope of making progress towards peace in Ukraine.

French President Emmanuel

Macron has been pushing for a thaw between Europe and Russia but Maas said it was too early to ease sanctions.

“We will continue what we thought was right so far — to extend the sanctions — because the reasons that led to the sanctions continue to exist,” Maas said as he arrived for a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels.

“At the moment, for me, there is no reason to change anything in the sanctions policy of the European Union toward Russia.”

Yesterday’s meeting in Paris of Macron, Russian leader

Vladimir Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is the first so-called “Normandy Format” summit in three years.

It seeks to implement accords signed in Minsk in 2015 that call for the withdrawal of heavy weapons, the restoration of Kiev’s control over its borders, wider autonomy for Donetsk and Lugansk, and the holding of local elections.

The EU insists the Minsk accords must be implemented if sanctions are to be lifted or relaxed.

(AFP)