EU to approve tougher sanctions aimed at ‘hurting’ the economy of Belarus

EUROPEAN Union foreign ministers will approve a fresh set of sanctions against scores of officials in Belarus and prepare a series of measures aimed at hurting the country’s economy, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said.

The EU has ratcheted up sanctions since President Alexander Lukashenko won a sixth term last August in elections criticised as fraudulent by the 27-nation bloc.

The measures have targeted people accused of electoral misconduct and responsibility for the police crackdown that followed.

“We will approve the package of new sanctions, which is a wider package,” Mr Borrell told reporters as he arrived in Luxembourg to chair the ministerial meeting.

He said asset freezes and travel bans will be slapped on a total of around 86 people and organisations. Diplomats have said that a number of those targeted are linked to an incident last month in which a Ryanair flight travelling from Greece to Lithuania was diverted to Minsk, where authorities arrested Roman Protasevich, a dissident journalist who was on board the airliner.

The EU has already banned Belarus airline companies from flying over the bloc’s territory or using its airports.

Mr Borrell said the ministers will also prepare a raft of economic sanctions for EU leaders to endorse at a summit on Thursday. “These are going to hurt; going to hurt the economy of Belarus heavily,” he said.

The measures are likely to include action against the export of potash – a common fertiliser ingredient – tobacco industry exports, petroleum products, and others.

“We will no longer just sanction individuals. We will now also impose sectoral sanctions – meaning, that we will now get to work on the economic areas that are of particular significance for

Belarus and for the regime’s income,” German foreign minister Heiko Maas said.

“We are really very, very determined not to budge, not just today – nothing about this will change in the coming weeks and months,” he said.

To kick off their meeting, the ministers held a working breakfast with Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the main opposition candidate to challenge Mr Lukashenko in last year’s election.