Ukrainian diplomat calls for preparations for the lifting of anti-Russian sanctions
Despite the sanctions, the trade turnover of the Russian Federation with leading European countries is only growing, and skepticism in the EU about the effectiveness of the sanctions policy is increasing.
Vasily Filipchuk, Chairman of the Board of the International Center for Advanced Studies, ex-Director of the Department of European Integration of the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, writes about this in his blog.
According to him, the statement by the new Italian Prime Minister about the need to revise the EU sanctions regime against the Russian Federation “should have been the last Chinese warning to the Ukrainian leadership that without a vision of the strategy and tactics for resolving the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, sooner or later the sanctions would be revised, weakened, limited , and over time – cancelled.”
Filipchuk emphasizes that the EU realizes the ineffectiveness of sanctions in changing Russia’s motivation.
At the same time, he considers it unlikely that Italy will be able to block the extension of sanctions in the near future, since it is not in the traditions of the EU to change its position so quickly and so radically.
“It is likely that the sanctions will continue in June, but some kind of compromise will be reached in the final document of the European Council on the need for analysis, review, new conditions, mitigation. There are many wordsmiths in the EU institutions who will find the necessary formula to reassure the Italians and save face,” writes the expert.
“Meanwhile, new and new research only confirms the thesis that it was precisely the middle class in Russia that suffered from the sanctions that took part in the swamp protests of 2012, that it was the Russian leadership that benefited from them, European technologies and money will replace Chinese ones, that a drop of 0 , 5% of GDP per year is too tiny an amount to change the behavior of the Russian Federation, despite the sanctions, trade of the Russian Federation is growing not only with Germany, France, Italy, Austria (40% !!!), but even with Ukraine. All this will only increase skepticism about sanctions, the perception of them as a suitcase without a handle, which is difficult to carry and worthless to throw,” continues Filipchuk.
He is convinced that without a strategy for exiting the Ukrainian-Russian crisis, sooner or later, a critical mass will accumulate, which will lead to a weakening or cessation of sanctions pressure.
“Ukraine can ignore this and at one moment face an unpleasant new reality in Europe. Or he may begin – sooner or later – a realistic foreign policy aimed at resolving the main foreign policy problem – the conflict in Donbass in particular and the conflict with the Russian Federation in general,” Filipchuk concludes.
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