The EU has confirmed it’s going to strike Russia’s diamond industry in upcoming sanctions, spelling trouble for mining giant Alrosa and dozens of other companies.
“We are in the process of preparing the 12th round [of sanctions] … in particular how to cut the revenues Russia draws from exports of diamonds to Europe and its partners,” said European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels on Friday (29 October).
She spoke after meeting the 27 EU leaders, including the Russophile prime ministers of Hungary and Slovakia, Viktor Orbán and Robert Fico. “We will continue providing much-needed ammunition … [and] financial relief [to Ukraine]”, despite the Gaza war and despite the pro-Russian voices at the EU’s top table, von der Leyen pledged.
The commission is also finalising legal plans to confiscate “windfall profits” arising from €211bn of frozen Russian money in EU capitals, she added. “The idea is to pool them and then to channel them via the EU budget en bloc to Ukraine, for the reconstruction of Ukraine,” she said.
For the rest of this article: https://euobserver.com/world/157623