2016 has the potential to become the final year of the sanctions, said the head of the international Committee of the state Duma Alexei Pushkov. The MP called existing sanctions residual phenomenon two years of confrontation that emerged between Russia and the EU due to the Ukrainian crisis.
MOSCOW, 20 Nov. The head of the international Committee of the state Duma Alexei Pushkov hopes that 2016 will be the last year of anti-Russian sanctions from the EU, but drew attention to the negative attitude of some countries to this perspective.
Relations between Russia and the West deteriorated in connection with the situation in Ukraine. The EU and the USA from the point of sanctions against certain individuals and companies have moved to measures against entire sectors of the Russian economy. In response, Russia has restricted food imports from countries that have imposed sanctions against her: USA, EU, Canada, Australia and Norway.
“Sanctions, in my opinion, now turn to the residual phenomenon of those two years of confrontation that we have with the EU because of the Ukrainian crisis,” Pushkov said in a live TV channel “Russia 24”. “If earlier the issue of Ukraine was No. 1, and sanctions were the main tool to work with Russia, in this case negative work with Russia, now they say that Ukraine departs on the second, third plan, the main priority — the fight against ISIS, here you need cooperation, and sanctions would remain in force that have not yet implemented the Minsk agreements”, — he explained.
According to him, there was a discussion about the lifting of personal sanctions, starting with the parliamentarians. “In Brussels all my interlocutors acknowledged that the need to expand the dialogue between the parliamentarians of the…, talking only of foreign Ministers, the Executive power, the heads of state and that is rare,” said Pushkov.
He believes that in this situation “need to expand and need to get back to dialogue between parliamentarians”. “My feeling following that 2016 has the potential to become the final year of sanctions”, — said the head of the international Committee of the state Duma.
According to him, some countries will oppose the withdrawal from the Russia sanctions. “Now, recently, Lithuania and Sweden stated that they continued for a long period of sanctions, I believe that two other Baltic republics, it is possible that Poland will insist on this, I do not exclude that the UK, but it seems to me that the EU is now gradually begin to create a critical mass for a speedy lifting of sanctions, and not to be renewed for an indefinite period”, — concluded the gun.
On Thursday, the Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed European officials and diplomats wrote that the European Union is about to extend anti-Russian sanctions adopted in connection with the crisis in Ukraine, examines three alternatives, including the extension of restrictive measures for 3-4 months.
