MOSCOW: Russia has barred 89 EU citizens from entering the country, singling out politicians and other officials from nations that spearheaded the introduction of sanctions against Moscow following last year’s annexation of Crimea.
More than half of the names on the list, seen by the Financial Times but not published by Russian authorities, are from EU member states such as Poland, the Baltic states, UK and Sweden, that have been the most fierce critics of Moscow’s annexation of Crimea, its role in the war in eastern Ukraine and its sabre-rattling against Nato.
Countries that have taken a softer stance towards Moscow, such as Italy, Hungary, Austria and Slovakia, were absent from the list.
The bans highlight Russia’s attempts to divide the EU into friends and foes as it struggles with a breakdown in relations with the 28-country bloc. It also comes just weeks before the EU must decide whether and how to extend sanctions against Russia imposed last year.
Moscow presented details of the blacklist to EU member countries after Karl-Georg Wellmann, a German lawmaker and member of chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian-Democratic party, was denied entry at a Moscow airport last Sunday.
Russian officials said the visa bans had been imposed step by step since the middle of last year in response to “hostile acts against the Russian Federation”. Over the course of the Ukraine crisis the EU has placed travel bans on dozens of Russians and Ukrainian separatists.
A Russian diplomat confirmed the blacklist would affect “individuals who have been whipping up Russophobe sentiment” before adding: “We are particularly disappointed with Germany.”
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany’s foreign minister, on a visit to Ukraine over the weekend, criticised Russia’s policy saying he did not think it was “particularly clever” to apply such travel bans.
Michael Fuchs, deputy head of the CDU parliamentary group and one of the seven Germans included on the Russian list, also took issue with Moscow’s decision.
