Description: Europe’s foreign ministers met on Tuesday as they brought forward the 17th wave of sanctions against Russia as a response to the unproductive information coming out of the Trump – Putin phone call. The UK in a joint coordinated effort with the EU also imposed sanctions on approximately 100 new financial institutions flagged to have supported Russia’s war against Ukraine. The EU sanctions package was reportedly comprised of sanctioning new 189 vessels pertaining to Russia’s shadow fleet bringing the total number of sanctioned vessels to 342. The package also included several business entities which are registered in China that were identified to have provided Russia with military equipment and major oil companies such as Surgutneftegaz and a shipping insurance firm called JSC VSK. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has stated that EU and UK sanctions would have much larger impact if it were supported by the US, which according to the latest reports has decided to sustain in imposing new sanctions measures on Russia.
Impact: Europe’s and UK’s joint sanctions package is more of a political response rather than an effective way of crippling Russia’s warfare capabilities. The new sanctions package represents a response from the European leaders to Russia’s refusal to engage in ceasefire negotiations and a positive sign in what could be stated as Europe’s unilateral approach towards the war without depending on or consulting the US. Russia has so far managed to resist the economic pressure from the sanctions emphasizing their ineffectiveness as a concrete measure by itself. Besides putting additional pressure on Russia which by all means should be stipulated as limited, EU and the UK should formulate a joint strategy to support Ukraine’s war efforts in the long term, as recent developments have demonstrated that Russia hasn’t changed or even modified its demands or approach to halting hostilities.