Sanctions Against Russia: 13th Package Coming Soon

The European Union has reached a compromise on a new series of anti-Russian sanctions that will primarily “hit” companies that cooperate with Moscow and help Russia evade previously imposed sanctions. As announced by Belgium, the EU’s acting president, the bloc’s ambassadors reached a general agreement on Wednesday, February 21, on the 13th package of sanctions against Russia, which will undergo a written procedure and must be formally approved by February 24, the second anniversary of the start of the armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

Details of the 13th sanctions package have not yet been disclosed. The sanctions, as is well known, are heavily focused on circumvention of previous sanctions and target companies around the world accused of supplying Russia with advanced technologies, products, and components imported from the EU. For the first time, the sanctions target Chinese companies suspected of helping the Russian defense industry purchase embargoed goods. Numerous companies in Turkey and North Korea, as well as many other countries around the world, will also be affected. About two hundred people and organizations, mostly Russian, have been added to the blacklist, which now contains more than 2000 names.

China has repeatedly rejected calls by the European Union and the USA for Beijing to join the anti-Russian policies of the West, Japan, and South Korea. Instead, economic and trade exchange between Russia and China reached a record of more than $240 billion in 2023, easily surpassing the $200 billion target set by the two leaders as a goal for 2024. Moscow said the Russian economy has managed to adapt to both the economic sanctions and the West’s freezing of Russian assets estimated at $300 billion. In 2023, the Russian economy grew by 3.4 percent year-on-year.

At the same time, in Brussels, US President Joe Biden confirmed that his administration is preparing “a large new package of sanctions against Russia.”

Russia also announces retaliatory measures, canceling numerous trade agreements with so-called “unfriendly” countries. The last one, “thrown into the trash” on February 21 by the State Duma (the Chamber of Deputies of the Russian Parliament), was the agreement allowing British sailors to fish freely in the Russian economic zone of the Barents Sea. By some estimates, 40% of the cod on the tables of British consumers comes from the icy waters of Russia’s northern seas.