The last meeting between the member countries of the European Union in 2022, this Wednesday (14) and Thursday (15), in Brussels, Belgium, ended with an agreement to provide € 18 billion (R$ 102 billion) in financing to the Ukraine to fight Russia in 2023.
The ninth package of sanctions against the country led by Vladimir Putin, who invaded Ukraine in late February, was also approved, after Poland withdrew last-minute objections.
The value, although large, is a fraction of what Ukraine had in financial, humanitarian and military aid in 2022. According to the German Kiel Institute for Global Economy, the country has already received €94 billion from 40 countries, €52 billion of which came from the United States, €29 billion from the European Union, and €12.3 billion from other countries, particularly the United Kingdom.
The package also provides for a total ban on exports of drones – or parts of drones, such as engines – to Russia and countries that could pass them on to Moscow, such as Iran. The proposal had been made by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, earlier this month. “The next six months will require even greater efforts,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told 27 EU leaders gathered in Brussels, urging them to provide more support in the areas of air defense and energy equipment.
The new sanctions also add 200 names to the blacklist of Russian companies and entrepreneurs, preventing, for example, investments in Russia’s mining industry, among others. Until then, the block had 1,241 individuals and 118 entities on the blacklist.
On the other hand, in the name of food security for the bloc and other countries, the package also provided for relief in the trade of fertilizers and Russian agricultural products, facilitating the passage of exports through European ports, even in cases where companies belonged to oligarchs. on the blacklist.
Russia is a major exporter of food and fertilizer products, but the biggest exporters of these products —Uralchem, Eurochem and Acron— are companies controlled by businessmen targeted by sanctions by the bloc, respectively Dmitri Mazepin, Andrei Melnichenko and Viatcheslav Moshe Kantor.
Thus, some EU member countries did not agree with this facilitation and refused to approve the new agreement. Poland and Lithuania opposed the proposal, unlike at least six nations in the bloc with a large port infrastructure: Belgium, France, Germany, Holland, Portugal and Spain.
Under sanctions, the assets of these oligarchs have been frozen, and any trader under EU jurisdiction is prohibited from trading with them. Intermediaries such as financial institutions, insurance companies, transporters and wholesalers are, in practice, barred from doing business with these companies.
An EU diplomat told Reuters news agency on Thursday morning that Poland and the Baltic countries are telling other EU nations they are deluding themselves if they think a relaxation in Russian fertilizers will not be used as a loophole by oligarchs.
Upon arriving at the meeting, Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda told reporters that the key was “to keep sanctions as strong as possible”. “We are a little concerned about attempts to relax the sanctions mechanism under the cover of food security. Food security is important, but it should not be used as an excuse for a relaxation of sanctions because, every day, the Ukrainian people are dying under Russian bombs,” he added.
Some member states also cited that the UN World Food Program should be involved in authorizing the export of fertilizers to countries that need the product.
The meeting had other topics on the agenda, such as the energy crisis, security and defense issues and the role of ten Mediterranean nations that are not part of the European Union, such as African countries, Israel and Arab countries. Charles Michel, president of the European Council, said that “it is a summit with many serious and difficult items on the agenda. We will work to make it a summit of unity”.
The meeting also granted Bosnia and Herzegovina formal EU candidate status. Meanwhile, in Prague, Czech Republic, the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti, submitted a request for his country to join the bloc. The act formally begins a process that could take years, even decades, and depends on the normalization of relations with neighboring Serbia — from which Kosovo declared independence in 2008.
Kurti handed over the request to Czech Minister for EU Affairs Mikulas Bek. “This is a historic day for the people of Kosovo and a great day for democracy in Europe,” Kurti told reporters in Prague.
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