EU to sanction Russians over Navalny poisoning, diplomats say

[webfact]

EU to sanction Russians over Navalny poisoning, diplomats say

 

FILE PHOTO: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny delivers a speech during a rally to demand the release of jailed protesters, who were detained during opposition demonstrations for fair elections, in Moscow, Russia September 29, 2019/File Photo

 

LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - European Union foreign ministers backed a Franco-German plan on Monday to impose sanctions on Russians suspected of poisoning Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny with a nerve agent, diplomats said.

 

Berlin and Paris made their proposal at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg. They say they have not had a credible explanation from Moscow for what the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said was the presence of the banned Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok in Navalny's body.

 

The speed with which the EU's two main powers have agreed to push ahead with sanctions suggests a hardening of the bloc's stance towards Moscow. It took almost a year for the EU to agree sanctions against Russians after a nerve agent attack in 2018 on a former Russian spy in Britain.

 

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told reporters as he arrived at the meeting earlier on Monday that Navalny's poisoning could not "remain without consequences".

 

"France and Germany propose imposing sanctions on certain people that caught our eye in this respect," Maas said, without giving any details.

 

EU diplomats told Reuters there was broad support among the 27 foreign ministers for asset freezes and travel bans on several Russian GRU military intelligence officials.

 

Moscow denies any involvement in Navalny's poisoning.

 

Senior Russian lawmaker Vladimir Dzhabarov said on Monday that Russia may respond to the EU sanctions symmetrically and repeated Moscow's line that there was no concrete evidence behind the accusations, Interfax news agency reported.

 

The sanctions are not expected to be approved immediately as legal texts must be prepared and cleared by experts from the 27 EU states.

 

Navalny fell ill on a flight in Siberia on Aug. 20 and was subsequently airlifted to Berlin for treatment. Blood samples taken from him confirmed the presence of a nerve agent from the banned Novichok family, the OPCW said last week.

 

Western governments and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation have said that Russia must help in investigations or face consequences.

 

Austria's foreign minister, Alexander Schallenberg, whose country has tended to favour closer ties with Russia, said there could not be a "return to business as usual" and that Moscow had failed to help clear up doubts about the poisoning.

 

(Reporting by Sabine Siebold in Berlin and Robin Emmott in Brussels; Additional reporting by Andrey Ostroukh in Moscow; Editing by Kevin Liffey, Gareth Jones and David Clarke)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-10-13

 

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[Jack Mountain]

Why sanctions when there is no proof who supplied the N. stuff? Maybe the same company who supplied Trump COVID 19. Both up in no time ...

If Russia wanted him dead then he would be gone.

Edited October 13, 2020 by Jack Mountain

[Tug]

Good they shouldn’t be allowed to get away with it without consequences 

[alianware]

1 hour ago, Jack Mountain said:

Why sanctions when there is no proof who supplied the N. stuff? Maybe the same company who supplied Trump COVID 19. Both up in no time ...

If Russia wanted him dead then he would be gone.

It's bio weapon, which only highest leader of rusia and certain commander can command to use it.

[dimitriv]

1 hour ago, Jack Mountain said:

no proof

 

No proof?  Several labs found Novichok in his body, something only the Russian government has access to. 

 

The only thing to complain about are the sanctions. Merkel who showed to be pro Russian again and again in the past needed some sanctions without really hurting Russia. And that is what they will get, sanctions that will not change anything. 

 

 

 

[2 is 1]

Russian leaders doing what they want anyway! Sanctions only hurting coundrys who have make sale to Russia!

Its easy to tell what to do if don't have over 1300 kilometer border whit them! Like Finland have!

Cant sell many items now to Russia what Finland have sell before! All Ukrainian thing's and poisoning people are really wrong, but always big coundrys like Russia,China,USA do like they want! And if like KGB want somebody to die he or she really die , not stay alive to tell "story"!

Edited October 13, 2020 by 2 is 1

[edwinchester]

2 hours ago, Jack Mountain said:

Why sanctions when there is no proof who supplied the N. stuff? Maybe the same company who supplied Trump COVID 19. Both up in no time ...

If Russia wanted him dead then he would be gone.

They don't need him dead to send a message. Opponents of Putin's regime only need to look at what happened to Navalny and the Skripal's in the UK to see what is very likely to go down if they overstep the mark.

[Jack Mountain]

3 hours ago, edwinchester said:

They don't need him dead to send a message. Opponents of Putin's regime only need to look at what happened to Navalny and the Skripal's in the UK to see what is very likely to go down if they overstep the mark.

So in this case it doesn't matter who has done it. Potentional opponents will assume it was Russia. So whoever has done it, he/she did Putin a favor. Not that he need it. ROFLOL

[Phoenix Rising]

The US will not follow suit as Putin has ordered trump to stand down and stand by.

[Mavideol]

7 hours ago, webfact said:

EU to sanction Russians over Navalny poisoning, diplomats say

waste of time and energy as long as Merkel still so dependent of the Putin/Gazprom deal, she won't do anything to <deleted> off Vlad

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/gas-market-buys-merkel-and-putin-time-on-nord-stream-2/ar-BB19UkcM

Gas Market Buys Merkel and Putin Time on Nord Stream 2

[Emdog]

5 hours ago, 2 is 1 said:

Russian leaders doing what they want anyway! Sanctions only hurting coundrys who have make sale to Russia!

Its easy to tell what to do if don't have over 1300 kilometer border whit them! Like Finland have!

Cant sell many items now to Russia what Finland have sell before! All Ukrainian thing's and poisoning people are really wrong, but always big coundrys like Russia,China,USA do like they want! And if like KGB want somebody to die he or she really die , not stay alive to tell "story"!

Nice job Ivan. My inner voice clicked on late show host Russian accent. Works better that way.

[ukrules]

This incident is quite a coincidence, also why was he taken to Germany so it specifically became an issue for them to deal with?

 

The whole thing stinks of a setup against Russian interests to me.

 

I'm being completely impartial when I say that, I don't give a <deleted> about the Russians, or the EU.

[connda]

Putin's assassins must be some of the most incompetent wet-work guys in the world.

Tried to assassinate a minor nobody with the Skriptals with Novichok.  Failed miserably.
Tried to assassinate another minor nobody Navalny with Novichok.  Then had Navalny in the hospital in a coma and at their mercy.....and...failed miserably.  Again.  They even let him leave Russia with a souvenir bottle of Novichok to prove his was poisoned by Putin's inept assassins. Heck, if worked so poorly before, why not do it again and again and again?

Also interesting that the "most deadly nerve agent on the planet" can be carried around in a water bottle, placed on doorknob, and nobody but "the target" get sick.

If anyone ever decides to assassinate me, I hope it's a inept Russian with a bottle of Novichok. 

[connda]

20 minutes ago, ukrules said:

This incident is quite a coincidence, also why was he taken to Germany so it specifically became an issue for them to deal with?

 

Nordstream 2. 

[DrTuner]

Good. #1 threat to Europe is Russia, #2 illegal immigrants, #3 China. Deal with them with determination.

[dimitriv]

1 hour ago, connda said:

Also interesting that the "most deadly nerve agent on the planet" can be carried around in a water bottle, placed on doorknob, and nobody but "the target" get sick.

 

That's for sure not true. 

 

"On 30 June 2018, a similar poisoning of two British nationals in Amesbury, seven miles north of Salisbury, involved the same nerve agent.^[20][21] A man found a perfume bottle, later discovered to contain the agent, in a litter bin somewhere in Salisbury and gave it to a woman who sprayed it on her wrist.^[22][23] The woman, Dawn Sturgess, fell ill within 15 minutes and died on 8 July, but the man, Charlie Rowley, who also came into contact with the poison, survived.^[24] British police believe this incident was not a targeted attack, but a result of the way the nerve agent was disposed of after the poisoning in Salisbury"  source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_Skripal

 

It seems very hard for some people to accept that:

 

1) Only the Russian government has access to Novichok

2) an attempted murder using Novichok automatically means that the Russian government is involved.

 

Creating confusion is something usually done by Russian trolls. If you can't win based on simple facts, then you're going to invent alternative truths to make people question what really happened. But the facts here are every clear. 

 

 

 

 

[pacovl46]

The fact that the Russians had one of the inventors of Novichok, Leonid Rink, give a speech on how this couldn’t have been Novichok otherwise he would be already dead and that it must have been the Germans who poisoned Navalny with Novichok, tells me beyond the shadow of a doubt that it is the Russian government behind the whole thing! 
 

First of all, why would one of the inventors make a public statement to begin with, since he was neither asked about nor accused of anything by foreign nations or media. He’s got nothing to gain from being involved in the situation. He just came out publicly totally out of the blue.
 

Second of all, what do the Germans have to gain from poisoning Navalany? That’s just preposterous! Also, he fell ill while still in Russia!

Third of all, it couldn’t have been Novichok, but it was the Germans who poisoned him with Novichok?! If it couldn’t have been Novichok then why do you say it was the Germans who poisoned him with Novichok?! Total contradiction, either it could’ve been or it couldn’t have been Novichok! Make up your fricking mind! 
 

Lastly, obviously it was Novichok, and as the inventor of it, he knows perfectly well what it does, therefore Rink was fricking lying when he says it couldn’t have been Novichok! So, why would he lie when he’s not accused of anything? Because he was pushed by someone to do so. Who’s the one who got anything to gain from the lies? The guy who ordered the hit and in my opinion it’s pretty obvious who that is, given the “mission” Navalny has been on! 
 

 

[KKr]

23 hours ago, connda said:

must be some of the most incompetent wet-work guys in the world

do not believe spin-doctors or propaganda from any side.

[Morch]

On 10/13/2020 at 7:08 AM, Jack Mountain said:

Why sanctions when there is no proof who supplied the N. stuff? Maybe the same company who supplied Trump COVID 19. Both up in no time ...

If Russia wanted him dead then he would be gone.

 

Why the same old nonsense defense?