German officials say an EU summit planned for this week will focus on the “second phase” of sanctions to be imposed against Russia, expected to include more travel bans, more asset freezes, and broad trade restrictions. The “third phase” isn’t planned yet but won’t be ruled out either.
The EU imposed its first phase of sanctions against Russia on Monday, but after the Russian government mocked them, many hawks have been pushing to get new ones in place fast. There is considerable resistance from several nations, led by Austria, who fear the sanctions will hurt the EU more than Russia.
Russia doesn’t seem to be sweating the possibility of more sanctions at any rate, with a spokesman for President Putin saying that “the one side of the globe impose sanctions, we will pay attention to new partners from the globe’s other side.”
That might well be the case, as Russia’s exports to the EU are largely oil and gas, and there are no shortage of customers for that around the world. Russia has already been keen to pick up its trade with China and this may accelerate the process.
By contrast Austria’s fears seem entirely justified, as it will be much easier for Russia to find other buyers for their oil and gas, but the EU may struggle to find other convenient suppliers, especially with Libya and Syria both producing next to nothing because of unrest.
Who els but Germans would want to have another round of sanction against Russia, the plan for Germans and other European manufacturing corporations was to get their hand into Ukrainians factories in east, like they did in Yugoslavia by destroying the self sufficient Yugoslavia, wanting for the country to be their slaved labour camp, as in Balkan and eastern Germany and other part of Eastern Europe, they have ruined the labour laws, people’s pension and whatever the people of Eastern Europe have worked for, they want to do the same in Ukraine but facing difficulties where people questioning the motives of Western Europe being so eager wanting to monopolize on east by building a NATO military base while destroying what people have. But European Union expansion has become the nightmare for the majority of Europeans where the poverty is on the rise as the cost of living while food banks are the result of a vulture capitalism system backed by NATO militarism throughout Europe.
Pfff….. Whatever. Are you actually making things up while you write or do you have it all written down in a a little book?
I wonder which of the EU countries will be the first to leave NATO and the idiot policies they're pushing. This could be the beginning of the end of NATO…finally, since NATO's real mission ended with the dissolution of the USSR. When the "enemy" fell, well, they just had to create more enemies to justify keeping US forces in place.
NATO is indeed discredited but I don't think countries will leave it. It will just become moribund, with the European members setting up a purely European defence arrangement, without the US and Canada but including Russia. If the US won't defend Europe against Putin then Europe simply has to make its peace with Putin!
The problem for Russia is not what it sells to the EU but what it buys. Everybody in modern Russia wants a West European car. There is a huge market for mainly German cars in Russia, even second-hand ones for the many who are too poor to buy new ones. Similarly, Russia's ramshackle military has got both helicopters and ships on order in EU Member States. Russia's aircraft industry is practically dead and most Russian airlines now use Airbuses and Boeings, just like airlines everywhere. Trying to go back to the crude products of the Soviet era will create huge popular dissatisfaction and nobody wants a Chinese car with some funny name like Long Chung or something! Putin is talking big, but he stands to lose a lot more than he gains. The reverse is true of the EU, for which a cutback in Russian oil and gas supplies would simply lead to a revival of nuclear power and further steps towards a more ecological society, a road down which the EU has gone much, much furtehr than the US.
You may want to explain exactly how a "cutback in Russian oil and gas supplies" is magically going to lead to "a revival of nuclear power" (protip: there is not much popular support as people hope for "alternative energies" to come online and there would be a > 10-year lead time for any new constructions anyway)
…and also how this would lead to "a more ecological society", whatever that is.
There is scant leeway in the socialistic economy of Yurop and it's getting scanter every minute with another EURO crash as soon as this summer very much in the realm of the possible.
Papers yesterday proclaimed that the the price of oil and gas would soon sink (thus hiding inflation and upping GDP, one might imagine). I think that train has left the station last week. Maybe Yurop should get more buddy-buddy with Iran to get some gas delivery assurance.