February 22nd local time, the website of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement in response to the EU’s decision to impose sanctions on Russian citizens.
The statement said that the European Union Foreign Affairs Committee decided on the same day (22nd) to start imposing unilateral sanctions on Russian citizens, which was disappointing.
EU countries adhere to the so-called “collective discipline” and anti-Russian stereotypes, and once again instinctively press the “button” of sanctions.
In addition, the above move also violates the usual logic: first make a political decision about sanctions, and then plan to randomly select the “candidate” who is sanctioned.
The statement said that the recent large-scale anti-Russian information war within the European Union has been launched, which is unprecedented. It is against this background that the EU’s sanctions decision took place.
The excuse of information warfare is the visit of the European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Borelli to Russia on February 5.
The collective claim of Western media that the visit was “unproductive” and “extremely shameful”, which triggered calls within the EU to strengthen sanctions against Russia.
Obviously, the purpose of this information war is to find the so-called appropriate reason to inspire the foreign ministers of the European Union to “venge” and make up for the so-called damage to the EU’s diplomatic image at the cost of the further deterioration of Russia-EU relations.
The statement said that the “Global Human Rights Sanctions System” established by the European Union in December 2020 and the two sanctions mechanisms previously established by the European Union related to cyber attacks and chemical weapons incidents are mainly aimed at Russia.
Although the EU tries to position these measures as having some “global” characteristics, the anti-Russian nature behind them is easy to see through, and it is actually a means of containment against Russia.
Russia believes that the illegal and absurd demand of the European Union to release a Russian citizen (opposition figure Navaline) is absolutely unacceptable. Under Russian law, the citizen was convicted of economic crimes by Russian courts in Russian territory.
In international practice, acts like the EU are called interference in the internal affairs of sovereign states.
However, the EU’s “absolutely correctness” in the field of human rights is nothing but nonsense: police in many European cities are brutalizing on the streets, and the EU continues to attack media freedom, suppress the use of Russian, and promote its concept of a “rule-based world order”.
The statement stressed that the EU once again missed the opportunity to re-examine its sanctions and pressure policies against Russia.
This policy has been completely failed in previous years.
Russia can only regret that the EU’s concept of using diplomatic “weapons” such as ultimatums, pressure and sanctions is deeply rooted.
Although the EU pursues to become an independent pole on the international stage, it seems to have completely forgotten that this can only be achieved on the basis of respect for other countries, non-interference in their internal affairs and strict compliance with international law.
Earlier that day, around the Navaline incident of the Russian opposition, EU foreign ministers met to agree to expand sanctions on Russian individuals.
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