On 28 June 2017, following the update from French President Macron and German Chancellor Merkel to the European Council of 22-23 June 2017 on the implementation of the Minsk Agreements, the Council of the European Union prolonged the economic sanctions against Russia for a period of six months, until 31 January 2018.

These sanctions are part of the restrictive measures imposed by the European Union in response to the illegal annexation of Crimea and deliberate destabilization of Ukraine.

The sanctions target specific sectors of the Russian economy, namely the financial, energy and defence sectors, as well as the area of dual-use goods. In particular, they:

• limit access to EU primary and secondary capital markets for 5 major Russian majority state-owned financial institutions and their majority-owned subsidiaries established outside of the EU, as well as three major Russian energy and three defence companies;
• impose an export and import ban on trade in arms;
• establish an export ban for dual-use goods for military use or military end users in Russia; and
• curtail Russian access to certain sensitive technologies and services  that can be used for oil production and exploration.

Davide Scavuzzo