Russian Federation to ban Ukrainian food imports from January

Russia has been slapped with Western consents for adding Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula and backing up ace Russian protestors in eastern Ukraine.

Later that month, Ukraine expanded a list of sanctions against 90 Russian companies and 400 individuals. In Kyiv, the Government drew different conclusions.

Moscow is yet to receive a prepayment from Kyiv for its winter-time natural gas deliveries to Ukraine, Russia’s Energy Minister Alexander Novak said Saturday.

But Stoicescu and Goble say that Putin is mistaken if he believes he will get a pass on Ukraine or be able to slouch on the Minsk agreement because of Russia’s bombing raids in Syria.

Baltic and central European member states are anxious that the EU executive and west European partners may be preparing to let Moscow off the hook of sanctions over Ukraine in return for cooperation in the Middle East.

On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin, said that Russia is ready to restructure Ukraine’s $3 billion in Eurobond debt with payment installments for three years ($1 billion in each year 2016-2018).

During a brief meeting on the sidelines of the week-long G20 summit in Antalya, Turkey, the leaders of U.S., Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and French foreign minister Laurent Fabius, who represented President Francois Hollande at the summit, concluded to uphold pressure on Russian Federation until July next year, ahead of elections in eastern Ukraine, Reuters reported on Sunday, citing an unnamed senior European diplomat.

“And our agreement is that in such case we will extend sanctions”, he told Reuters. “There is a general feeling right now that the sanctions should be rolled over”, he said. The sanctions can only be lifted when the February ceasefire deal is fully implemented.

Vice President Joe Biden will make his fifth visit to Ukraine in December, and the US recently announced a $1 billion loan guarantee pending certain reforms.

The increasingly fractious parliament also has threatened to undo measures that are key to its $40 billion bailout package from the International Monetary Fund. Many countries spent decades of the 20th century under Russia’s de facto control, and the Kremlin’s destabilization of a former Soviet state has brought back bad memories.

They noted Schulz had frozen Russia cooperation pending Minsk implementation and following a Russian visa ban on several MEPs.

Andrey Ostroukh in Moscow contributed to this article.