EU ambassadors on Wednesday approved the bloc’s 19th set of sanctions on Moscow since the full-scale invasion began in 2022, effectively moving up the “shut-off” date for Russian gas deliveries to Europe by a year.
Under the new measures, Europe will “turn off the taps” on Jan. 1, 2027 to the LNG pipeline that has supplied the EU for decades with heating energy, especially.
The sanctions forbid all transactions with two of the country’s largest energy companies, Rosneft and Gazprom Neft, and identified an additional 117 vessels from Russia’s “shadow fleet” of oil tankers operating under the radar of international sanctions. The added ships bring the total to 558.
Brussels also took steps to clamp down on suspected spies for Moscow by imposing controls on Russian diplomats’ travel around Europe. They now have to inform the authorities in countries where they are stationed of any travel abroad.
Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico had dragged his heels on the proposed measures as his Kremlin-friendly country was exclusively dependent on Russian gas. But he agreed to drop his opposition to sanctions on Wednesday after claiming to get assurances from the EU that it would protect its car industry from the Union’s strict climate legislation.
Hungary also regularly voiced its disapproval with the measures, along with countries such as France, Spain and the Netherlands, who round out the top-five European importers of Russian LNG, but the measures create a legal mechanism for those importing companies to break long-term contracts with Moscow in order to avoid massive law suits.
In her statement on the 19th package of sanctions against Russia, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen declared that Europe must hit the financing of Russia’s war effort at the root.
“It is time to turn off the tap, von der Leyen said. We are prepared for this. We have been saving energy, diversifying supplies and investing in low-carbon sources of energy like never before. Today, these efforts pay off.”
A previous draft of the sanctions package called for EU members to phase out new Russian gas import contracts from January 2026, existing short-term contracts from June 2026 and long-term contracts in January 2028.
Under the approved plan, the EU also plans to lower the price cap for Russian crude oil to $47.60 per barrel.
“In three years, Russia’s oil revenues in Europe have gone down by 90 percent. We are now turning that page for good,” von der Leyen added.
The sanctions will be formally adopted on Thursday ahead of President Volodymyr Zelensky’s appearance at a summit with the leaders of member countries in Brussels.
