The foreign ministers of the European Union countries have decided on anti-Russian sanctions, which will be introduced due to the situation with Alexei Navalny. This information was confirmed by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign and Security Policy of the EU Josep Borrell, quoted by RIA Novosti.
The technical bodies of the union will soon start completing the procedure. Borrell did not clarify what specific decision the members of the association made, but stressed that all the participants in the meeting approved it.
“We must intensify our assistance to Russian civil society, human rights activists, we must continue to build bridges between our peoples,” the EU representative stressed.
He also said that the sanctions should not interfere with the joint work of Brussels and Moscow. In particular, this should not hinder the settlement of the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Earlier, the European Union talked about the problems with the introduction of sanctions due to the incident with Navalny. The association faced a legal difficulty: in order to impose sanctions against specific individuals and organizations in Russia, it is necessary to find suspects in the case. However, they are missing, and so far the EU is trying to solve this problem.
On October 10, the Russian Foreign Ministry recalled that the Prosecutor General's Office sent requests for legal assistance to Germany, but did not receive an answer, so the investigation does not have enough materials to initiate a criminal case. The department also said that Berlin did not provide test results confirming the poisoning of the oppositionist.
Navalny became ill on August 20 during a flight from Tomsk to Moscow. In the first two days, doctors from the Omsk hospital helped him. They also introduced him to an artificial coma. On August 22, the patient was sent to a clinic in Berlin, whose doctors announced the discovery of traces of a substance from the Novichok group in Navalny's body.
