It's gone for six months. Meeting on Thursday 12 December at a summit in Brussels, EU leaders unanimously extended economic sanctions against Russia, announced the presidency of the European Council. They target the oil, defense and Russian banks sectors.
These sanctions were decided in 2014 after the annexation of Crimea by Moscow. More specifically, they were imposed after the death of 298 passengers on a Malaysia Airlines flight shot down by a missile over Ukraine in July 2014. They had been extended for six months last June.
Meeting in four months
The extension of the sanctions comes days after a meeting in Paris on the restoration of peace in Ukraine between the French, German, Russian and Ukrainian leaders without major breakthrough for the resolution of this conflict. A new meeting in the same format was convened in four months.
The conflict between Russian-backed combatants and Ukrainian troops has left more than 13,000 people dead since 2014. Relations between Moscow and Kiev have eased somewhat since Volodymyr Zelensky was elected president of Ukraine.
French President Emmanuel Macron has called for a thaw in relations with Moscow, but the EU insists on full compliance with the 2015 Minsk agreements before any normalization. These agreements, approved by Moscow and Kiev, aim to end the fighting and to find a political solution for the separatist regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.
With AFP
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