EU supported Ukraine/European Parliament
The European Parliament adopted several resolutions on Ukraine last week. What is the most important thing about them?
Annual liberalization of trade with Ukraine
For us, this means the abolition for a year:
- import duties on industrial products;
- a system of “input” prices for fruits and vegetables, in which the difference with average European prices and Ukrainian goods was charged as a tax;
- anti-dumping duties on steel.
- 6,000 Russian oligarchs identified by Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation (at least they are of some use);
- Russia-related media organizations operating in the EU, in particular the “news agency” InfoRos, which is associated with the GRU ;
- European board members of large Russian companies, including former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.
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The EU is Ukraine's largest trading partner, to which we export goods worth almost $27 billion a year. Making it easier for our products to enter the European market is a much needed step when our exports fell 4 times due to the Russian invasion.
Unfortunately, some “non-trade” barriers still remain that deal with standards and bureaucracy. I hope this will be resolved.
In the European Parliament itself, in speeches and conversations with politicians, I constantly emphasize the need to help with our ability to export. Blocked ports and air is a big economic challenge that we must deal with. But close cooperation and reciprocal steps from partners are required.
Punishment for genocide
The second part of the resolutions is devoted to the investigation of the crimes of the Russians. The European Parliament calls on Ukraine to urgently ratify the Rome Statute and become a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC), also known as the Hague Tribunal. Therefore, to bring national legislation and procedures in line with international law.
This is important for the effective investigation of Russian atrocities.
Recall that in March the prosecutor of the ISS announced that he had begun an investigation into war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine. The prosecution services of some EU member states, as well as our Prosecutor General's Office, have begun investigating major international crimes, all of which is supported and coordinated by Eurojust.
But due to the constant shelling and occupation of part of the territories, it is impossible to securely store evidence in Ukraine. This should be done somewhere safe overseas. But the Eurojust Regulation does not directly allow it to collect, store and analyze evidence.
Therefore, for the sake of our case, the European Parliament is changing the rules of operation of Eurojust.
Using its own example, the European Parliament shows how “from the wheels” you can improve internal procedures to become more efficient, help or convict the perpetrators more quickly.
The European Parliament recognizes that Russia has committed massive and serious war crimes in Ukraine (does anyone still doubt, you ask? No, but such are the legal procedures).
And the responsibility lies with everyone who orders, intentionally commits or facilitates war crimes, including officials and military leaders of Russia.
Sanctions
The European Parliament also calls for expanding the sanctions list by:
I am grateful to the European Parliament for these steps. The European bureaucratic machine is not always about speed, but rather about captious fixation and the inevitability of punishment. It is on this principle that our dream of The Hague can come true for Putin and his henchmen.
