The foreign ministers of the countries of "united Europe" agreed on the introduction of sanctions against Russia because of the situation around Alexei Navalny.

This was stated by the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell following the meeting of the EU Council held in Luxembourg.

“Political agreement has been reached on the introduction of restrictive measures, the technical bodies of the council will deal with this,” Borrell stressed.

According to him, the EU countries unanimously approved this decision.

Earlier, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said that Germany and France had prepared proposals for anti-Russian sanctions due to the situation with Navalny.

He added that the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) "confirmed the results" of German, Swedish and French laboratories, which claimed to have found traces of a toxic substance from the Novichok group in the blogger's body.

At the same time, Maas later said that, despite this situation, the FRG is disposed to build good relations with Russia.

“Be that as it may, what happened to Alexei Navalny does not change geography and therefore does not change our fundamental interest in good or at least reasonable relations with Russia,” the German minister said in an interview with RIA Novosti.

According to him, Germany "lives on trade and scientific exchange" and intends to maintain "good relations" with all neighboring countries.

Maas added that it is difficult for him to name a colleague with whom he would have met more often than with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

The German diplomat also noted that the societies of Russia and Germany "maintain close ties, there is a live exchange at the level of civil society, between students, scientists, artists, in the economic sphere."

The incident with Alexei Navalny occurred on August 20, when he flew from Tomsk to Moscow.

On board the plane, he felt bad, after which the liner urgently landed in Omsk.

Navalny was hospitalized.

Relatives insisted on his transfer to the Berlin clinic "Charite".

When Russian doctors were able to stabilize Navalny's condition, he was transported to Germany.

Subsequently, the German authorities stated that he was allegedly poisoned with a nerve agent from the Novichok group.

At the same time, Russian doctors have repeatedly indicated that the tests carried out did not reveal any traces of toxic substances in the patient's body.

Commenting on the decision of the EU Council, a member of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs Sergei Tsekov, in a conversation with RT, called it "outrageous."

“It is clear that this decision will not have any impact on our life.

The very fact is extremely outrageous, and, in my opinion, it shows that the EU is degrading in its decisions, especially decisions concerning Russia, ”he stressed.

In turn, Aleksey Chepa, deputy chairman of the State Duma's international affairs committee, recalled that the Russian prosecutor's office had asked the German side for information on this incident four times and received no response.

“Last week we talked with our colleagues, members of the Bundestag, about this incident.

They are also surprised, because we turned to the Bundestag with a request to help us figure it out, and the Bundestag did not even voice our letter, ”he said.

Chepa stressed that from Berlin there are "all sorts of attempts to hide information" and not provide it to the Russian competent authorities.

“This raises a lot of questions about this incident.

When our doctors in Omsk were doing the tests, we passed the test results and biomaterials to the German side, when he (Navalny

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) was taken to Germany, "the deputy noted.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called the calls to investigate the situation with Navalny as absurd, in conditions when Moscow is not provided with any data and does not respond to Russian inquiries in this case.

The minister noted that the proposal to work together on the blogger's case "was arrogantly ignored." 

Speaking about the declaration of the EU countries about their intention to impose sanctions in connection with the current situation, Lavrov stated that Moscow's relations with the European Union "are actively degrading."

“We are no longer surprised that the European Union is acting without a trial or investigation, they are demanding that we conduct an investigation.

Even Germany does not provide us with any facts, stating that this is not a bilateral matter, but an international one, ”Lavrov said.

He pointed out that the German side calls on the OPCW on this issue, where, in turn, "they lie that the request from Germany was not received."