The Council of Europe decided to extend sanctions against Russia. Some are skeptical about their effectiveness, but are they right to be?
After 9 years of sanctions against Russia, the Council of Europe has today decided to extend them even more, for at least another six months. The decision came on Friday, when the Council published a statement on the matter.
“The Council today decided to prolong by six months, until 31 July 2023, the restrictive measures targeting specific sectors of the economy of the Russian Federation,” says the announcement.
The relationship between Russia and the European Union has never been especially peaceful. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the two powers have cohabited together, with few timid steps towards one another.
But the Maidan Revolution in Ukraine and the subsequent invasion of Crimea by Russia ended these times of peace. Ukraine was getting dangerously close to the EU for Russia, which decided to act.
This happened in 2014, and since then Russia and Ukraine have waged a low-level war in the Donbass. Until, of course, a full scale Russian invasion in February 2022 which ended peace in Europe.
We all know about last year’s European sanctions, but they date back to 2014 and the Crimean invasion. Since then, they increasingly became more and more intrusive in the Russian economy, and will now be extended in 2023 as well.
European sanctions against Russia: a timeline
Already in March 2014, months after the Russian occupation of Crimea, the first European sanctions were laid out. 21 Ukrainian and Russian officials were put under diplomatic restrictions. Later in June, goods coming from Crimea were banned in the European Union.
This was an important economical blow for Russia. Crimea is home to Sebastopol, currently Russia’s biggest and most important port. Indeed, one might say that the whole occupation of Crimea was carried out for the control of Sebastopol.
In July of the same year, the first sanction package by the European Union was agreed upon. It included restrictions on the purchase of Russian bonds, as well as an embargo on arms sale.
Sanction packages kept coming in the following years, but did not stop Russia from attacking Ukraine in 2022. In fact, their biggest revenue stream, gas and oil sales, was still completely intact.
Since the illegal invasion of Ukraine, however, 9 different sanction packages have been approved by the European Union. The latest ones also include the now famous price cap on Russian oil, as well as strong economic restrictions on the country and its individuals.
Billions in assets have been seized by Europe from the Russian Central Bank and many Russian oligarchs. Russia has been cut off from the SWIFT circuit and even Russian media have been targeted by sanctions.
Experts are still debating whether or not these sanctions have been effective. Some think that they will not work at all, while others believe that, given enough time, the Russian economy will collapse.
In six months, when these sanctions will likely be extended again, we will see who was right and who was wrong.
