On Monday 16 April, the foreign affairs ministers of the EU countries reaffirmed their commitment to Moscow in accordance with the five guiding principles defined in March 2016 (see EUROPE 11512).
"We have seen an evolving pattern of (...) challenging Russian behaviour in many different fields", High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini stated at the end of the discussion. She then listed the different challenges: Ukraine, at a time when "the full implementation of the Minsk agreements remains a key element for any substantial change in EU-Russia relations", Syria, activities of disinformation, internal interference, hybrid threats, malicious cyber activities, and inside Russia "a shrinking space for independent political voices, civil society, but also a decrease of respect for human rights and the rule of law".
Mogherini stated that "it has been painfully evident with the Salisbury attack that we need to reinforce our own resilience inside the European Union". A European source added that during the debate the member states had asked for the East Stratcom to be strengthened.
Another key commitment is support "for Russian citizens, civil society, human rights defenders, people to people contacts, especially with a focus on the youth of the Russian Federation". Mogherini stated that the ministers wanted not only to maintain, but also increase, the links between Russian and European people. She thus announced "a clear increase of our work and also hopefully of our funding on our work on people to people contact".
While the five principles are the subject of consensus, the states are more divided as to the sanctions towards Russia. For Lithuania's foreign minister, Linas Linkevičius, there is no reason to relax these measures and he argues that they should be extended for a year, and not six months as is currently the case. He also wanted European sanctions to be taken out in the Magnitsky affair (see EUROPE 11994). But according to Luxembourg's foreign minister, Jean Asselborn, Europeans do not support new sanctions. He thought the EU would lose if it supported a hardening of Russia's isolation. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)