BRUSSELS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th December, 2018) The majority of EU countries think that it would be counterproductive to impose new restrictive measures over the Kerch Strait incident at the current stage and stress the need to de-escalate the situation in the Azov Sea first, an EU source said on Thursday.
The EU leaders are discussing the bloc's external relations, including the latest developments in the Azov Sea, during the meeting of the European Council on Thursday and Friday.
At the moment, the majority of the EU countries believe that it would be counterproductive to impose new sanctions over the incident in the Kerch Strait as they think that it would be appropriate to first reduce tensions in the Azov Sea, the source familiar with the details of the discussion said.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said earlier in the day that the introduction of additional sanctions against Russia over the incident would complicate the talks on the de-escalation of situation.
On November 25, Ukraine's Berdyansk and Nikopol gunboats and the Yany Kapu tugboat illegally crossed the Russian maritime border as they sailed toward the Kerch Strait, the entrance to the Sea of Azov. The Ukrainian vessels were seized by Russia after failing to respond to a demand to stop.
Following the incident, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko signed a decree declaring martial law in several Ukrainian regions located near the Russian border. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that the incident was a provocation prepared in advance as a pretext to introduce martial law ahead of Ukraine's presidential election.
