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MEPs called for punitive measures including an “immediate full embargo” on Russian oil, coal, and nuclear fuel imports in a resolution that was passed with 513 votes to 22.
This should be accompanied with a plan to secure the EU’s energy supply security, and a strategy to “rollback sanctions in case Russia steps towards restoring Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty, territory integrity within its internationally recognized borders, and completely removing its troops from the territory.
Russia is exempted from the G20 and multilateral organizations
MEPs insist that existing sanctions must be implemented fully and effectively throughout the EU and by EU’s international allies. MEPs call for EU leaders to expel Russia from the G20, and other multilateral organizations, including UNHRC, Interpol and the World Trade Organisation. This would be a sign that the international community is not going to continue to do business with an aggressor state.
The Parliament demands that Russian banks be exempted from SWIFT, all Russian vessels to enter EU territorial waters, dock at EU ports, and road freight transport to and from Russia and Belarus be stopped to make the sanctions more effective. MEPs demand that “all assets belonging Russian officials or oligarchs associated to Putin’s regim, their proxies, and strawmen, along with those in Belarus connected to Lukashenka’s regime”, be seized.
The resolution points out Belarus’s involvement in the conflict in Ukraine and demands that sanctions against Belarus be mirrored those against Russia to close any loopholes that allow Putin to use Lukashenka to bypass sanctions.
Arms deliveries should continue and be stepped-up
The shocking atrocities committed by Russian troops in Ukraine, particularly in Bucha, as well as the destruction or nearly complete destruction of Mariupol and Volnovakha (recitals C & D) are what MEPs refers to. They demand that war criminals be held accountable, and that a UN special tribunal be established for crimes committed in Ukraine.
The Parliament reiterates its support for continued weapons deliveries to Ukraine in order to enable it to defend itself effectively. The MEPs support additional defensive assistance to the Ukrainian Armed Forces by EU member countries individually and collectively through European Peace Facility.
Given that almost 6.5 million Ukrainian citizens are internally displaced, and more 4 million have fled Ukraine because of the war (recital A), MEPs demand safe humanitarian corridors to evacuate civilians fleeing bombings and to increase EU’s humanitarian aid network in Ukraine.
They condemned the Russian rhetoric suggesting that they might resort to weapons of mass destruction, and stressed that such a deployment would bring about the most severe consequences.
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