EU heads of state and government called on their ministers on Thursday 18 October to adopt a sanctions regime for cyber-attacks.
"In light of the recent hostile cyber-attack carried out against the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons [OPCW], the European Council calls for measures to combat illegal cyber activities. In this context, we ask ministers to work on a sanctions regime that will be specific to cyber attacks", said European Council President Donald Tusk at the end of the meeting.
A European source explained to EUROPE that these should be targeted restrictive measures against persons and/or entities with an assets freeze and a visa ban.
According to Mr Tusk, "Such a regime should help to protect our citizens, companies and institutions from all kinds of cyber security threats”.
In their conclusions, the leaders called for "further work to be done on the ability to deter and respond to cyber-attacks with EU restrictive measures” in line with the ‘cyber-toolbox’ adopted by the EU in June 2017 (see EUROPE 12119, 11811). He added that “negotiations on all cybersecurity proposals should be completed before the end of the legislature".
The Heads of State and Government warned that the OPCW attack, attributed to the Russian Military Intelligence Service (GRU) (see EUROPE 12110), as well as the Salisbury chemical attack, reinforced their "common determination to further strengthen the EU's internal security and our ability and capacity to detect, prevent, disrupt and respond to hostile activities by foreign intelligence networks and other malicious actors on our territories and online".
But there is no way for Europeans to point the finger at Moscow. When asked about this, the President of the European Parliament, Antonio Tajani, said that "this kind of attack had been carried out from at least 15 different places around the world". According to a European source, no Member State mentioned Russia during the discussions at the European Council. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant with the editorial staff)