The
EU has agreed to freeze European assets linked to Russian President
Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov over their decision to invade
Ukraine, EU officials said on Friday.
اضافة اعلان
"We are hitting Putin's system where it has to be hit, not only
economically and financially, but also at the heart of its power," German
Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said as she arrived for a meeting in
Brussels with EU counterparts.
That is why "we now list also the president, Mr Putin, and foreign
minister Lavrov" to a packet of fresh sanctions agreed by EU leaders
overnight, she said.
The EU foreign ministers were to formally approve the sanctions, described
as the harshest ever imposed by the bloc.
They hammer Russia's financial, energy and transport sectors, curb the
ability of Russians to keep large amounts of cash in EU banks, and greatly
expand the number of Russians on the EU's list of individuals barred from
entering the bloc's 27 countries and freezing any EU assets.
But the measures stopped short of kicking Russia out of the SWIFT messaging
system used globally by banks to arrange transfers -- a major step that has
been used to devastating effect against Iran.
While Ukraine's beleaguered government is lobbying ferociously for the EU to
pull the trigger on a SWIFT ban for Russia, several EU countries -- most
notably Germany, which has to pay Russia for natural gas -- are reluctant.
An asset freeze directed at Putin and Lavrov -- both said by anti-corruption
campaigners to have amassed immense wealth -- has strong symbolic impact, but
it was unclear how European authorities could identify their assets with legal
certainty.
Two EU officials told AFP that Germany and Italy had been reluctant in the
overnight summit to add the asset freeze against the two to the sanctions
package.
- Hitting 'prime
architects' -
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was "personally very much
in favour" and other foreign ministers voiced support.
"If you're going to hit the Russian elite it makes sense to also look
into making sure you touch the prime architects of this endeavour, of this
darkness," Dutch Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra said.
Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said adding Putin and Lavrov's names
"is absolutely appropriate, given who the key decision makers are to
actually wage war on Ukraine."
The asset freeze on Putin and Lavrov was first reported by the Financial
Times based on three sources who said neither of the Russians would be subject
to an EU travel ban in order to keep diplomatic channels open.
But Ukraine's foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, tweeted angrily "let's
not let the EU get away with pretending that assets bans on Putin and Lavrov
can make up for real action".
He urged the bloc to "ban Russia from SWIFT".
Germany's chancellor, Olaf Scholz, said at the summit that his country
preferred to keep the SWIFT option in reserve.
Baerbock said on Friday: "Words like agreement on SWIFT sound very
tough, but in these moments you have to keep a cool head."
She argued that it would disproportionately hurt people like "a
granddaughter living in Europe who wants to transfer money to her grandmother
in Russia".
Those "responsible for the bloodshed" would have alternative ways
of getting around a SWIFT ban, she said.
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