Ukraine has called for more heavy weapons than its Western allies and “destructive” sanctions against Moscow as EU member states prepared to stop importing Russian coal but remained divided over a broader ban on energy sources.
“My agenda is very simple,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Thursday before a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels. There are only three elements on it. These are weapons, weapons and weapons. “
President Vladimir Zelensky said the new Western sanctions, especially from Europe, did not go far enough and Russia would see them as a “solution to the attack”. Some politicians are still “unable to decide how to limit the flow of … oil euros to Russia so as not to put their economies at risk,” he said.
The West must “bring Russia to justice,” Zelensky told the Greek parliament, teaching Moscow that “those who blackmail Europe with economic and energy crises always lose.” Andriy Ermak, head of the presidential office, said sanctions “must be disastrous enough to end this terrible war”.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the bloc must approve its fifth round of economic sanctions, including a ban on imports of Russian coal worth about 4 billion euros (3.3 billion British pounds) on Thursday, and that measures against Russian oil will be discussed by foreign ministers on Monday.
“Sooner or later, I hope sooner, this will happen,” Borel said. Zelensky is due to hold talks with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Kyiv on Friday, the Ukrainian government confirmed, adding that no preliminary details of the talks would be announced for security reasons.
But while welcoming a new wave of sanctions announced by the EU, Britain and the United States – targeting Vladimir Putin’s two daughters, as well as Russia’s largest public and private banks – Ukraine insisted Europe must go further. .
“We will continue to insist on a full oil and gas embargo on Russia,” Kuleba said. “I hope that we will never again face a situation where atrocities like Bucha must be exposed in order to increase the sanctions pressure.
Images of dead civilians, some with their hands tied, on the streets of Bucha, a city northeast of Kyiv returned by Russian invaders, have sparked international outrage and renewed calls from Ukraine to the West to stop buying Russian energy.
Kuleba stressed the vital importance of arms supplies as well as sanctions, calling on “all allies to put aside their hesitations, their unwillingness to provide Ukraine with everything it needs”. He added: “The more weapons we receive and the sooner they arrive in Ukraine, the more lives will be saved.”
Kyiv has called on its allies to supply heavier weapons such as air defense systems, artillery, armored vehicles and planes as Moscow prepares to resume its attack on the east of the country six weeks after its brutal invasion of Ukraine.
Kuleba said countries that do not want to supply offensive rather than defensive weapons are “hypocritical” because “there is no real difference between the two” in the conflict. “I think the deal that Ukraine is proposing is fair,” he said. “You give us weapons, we sacrifice our lives, and the war is limited to Ukraine.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg agreed that the distinction was irrelevant and said that members of the alliance would strengthen “air defense systems, anti-tank weapons, but also heavier weapons”. Now that Moscow is repositioning and rearming its forces, it was time for that, he said.
EU sources say Europe’s ban on Russian coal imports – the key measure in its latest sanctions – will be approved on Thursday, but will not take effect until August, a month later than proposed earlier after pressure from Germany. , the largest importer of Russian coal in the bloc. The United Kingdom must ban Russian coal by the end of the year.
However, punitive measures for oil and gas, which are much larger imports, have divided the EU-27, with member states more dependent on imports from Russia, fearing economic consequences. Russia accounts for about 40% of the EU’s natural gas consumption and a third of its oil imports.
Ukraine on Thursday accused Hungary, which said it was willing to pay in rubles for Russian gas, of taking an “enemy” stance. “If Hungary really wants to help end the war, here’s how to do it: stop destroying EU unity,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko.
Budapest should “support new anti-Russian sanctions, provide military assistance to Ukraine, and not create additional sources of funding for the Russian military machine,” he added. “It’s never too late to get to the right side of history.”
Putin called on Hungary’s nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orban, who has long sought rapprochement with Moscow to congratulate him after his party won a fourth consecutive term in last week’s general election. Ukraine’s foreign ministry said Budapest’s subsequent proposal for peace talks “seems cynical”.
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