Sixth package of EU sanctions targeting Russia must include oil embargo

The next package of sanctions that the European Union is set to impose on Russia must lay down an embargo on Russian oil.

That’s according to Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who addressed the issue on Twitter.

“Spoke with my Maltese counterpart Ian Borg. Grateful to Malta for supporting five previous rounds of EU sanctions on Russia. I stressed that the sixth EU sanctions package must necessarily include an oil embargo on Russia,” Kuleba tweeted.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, the chief of the Ukrainian President’s Office Andriy Yermak said that such an embargo was on the tables as EU members were discussing the sixth package of Russia sanctions.

Earlier, Yermak explained that the EU intended to gradually reduce gas purchases from Russia, while Ukraine sought to make sanctions tougher.

The EU leadership is looking into introducing an oil embargo against Russia, which would deliver one of the most powerful blows on Russia’s economy, which has already suffered greatly from sanctions over the full-scale war that the Kremlin unleashed against Ukraine on February 24.