On Monday 9 June, Poland’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Radosław Sikorski, said “legal changes to the maritime law” were needed to adapt it to the situation in the Baltic Sea, where old tankers transport Russian oil, sometimes without registration or insurance.
“In your territorial waters, you can do what you want; in your exclusive economic zone, you can react a little; but in international waters, you can do practically nothing”, said Mr Sikorski, answering questions in Warsaw from a group of journalists invited by the Polish Presidency of the EU Council.
Referring to the tankers in poor condition sailing in the Baltic Sea which are “completely unregistered and uninsured”, he called for a revision of the Copenhagen Convention of 1857 “before we face a huge environmental disaster” costing the community billions of euros.
Denmark and Germany recently boarded two oil tankers sailing under no flag and without valid insurance. We must show solidarity with these countries and “we need to change the maritime law”, stressed the Minister, referring to the Copenhagen Convention.
Mr Sikorski recalled that, under the Polish Presidency of the EU Council, the EU had imposed sanctions on the captains and crews of oil tankers belonging to the Russian ‘shadow fleet’ (see EUROPE 13583/1). In this way, those penalised, if they do it again, will be banned from entering EU ports, he pointed out.
More generally, he said that Europeans should do their utmost to prevent authoritarian regimes from using the legal loopholes in the Western world to circumvent the sanctions adopted against them. What is done in times of peace should no longer be possible “in times of crisis”, he said.
Satisfied with the EU Council’s adoption of the SAFE instrument (see EUROPE 13649/23), the Polish Minister echoed the statements made by General Keith Kellogg, the US Special Envoy for Ukraine and Russia, who had given the EU a score of 6/10 for adopting sanctions against the Kremlin for its military aggression against Ukraine, but a score of 3/10 for implementing these sanctions. “This is where we should be concentrating a lot more”, he said.
He noted that the United States has 1,600 people to enforce financial transactions on a day-to-day basis in order to detect suspicious transactions subject to US sanctions. “Not all Member States have the administrative capacity or even the will” to overhaul their internal organisation as we have done, said the former MEP.
When asked about his expectations for the NATO summit in The Hague at the end of June, Mr Sikorski looked favourably on the ongoing discussions on increasing the Allies’ defence spending (see EUROPE 13654/13). “What I expect from this NATO summit is that we would pledge to go to the level of spending comparable to that of the US, which is 3,5% on hard defence plus 1,5% on other aspects of defence like military mobility, civil defence, cybersecurity”. For him, what US President Donald Trump is asking for, while “in his own inimitable style”, is in line with the demands of his predecessors.
Regarding the recent election of Karol Nawrocki, from the conservative political opposition (see EUROPE 13651/22), Mr Sikorski expressed his confidence that the President-elect would respect the “national consensus” to continue the policy of deterrence towards Russia. The majority of the defence contracts that we are currently financing were signed by the previous government, which was formed by the PiS party that supported Mr Nawrocki, noted the minister.
Following the Conservatives’ victory in the presidential elections, the Polish Parliament is due, on Wednesday, to cast a vote of confidence in Donald Tusk’s government.
Later that morning, the Polish Finance Minister, Andrzej Domański, noted once again that “some big Member States are strongly against” the confiscation of Russian public assets held in the EU. However, “there are more and more countries that, during Ecofin meetings, think that we should take more decisive steps” he said in response to a question from Agence Europe.
And Mr Domański pointed out that the Polish position has always been clear that “the aggressor must pay” for the reconstruction of Ukraine, and not just from the profits generated by frozen Russian assets. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)