MEPs resolved to send Putin ‘clear bill with high cost’ over Russian aggression

Europe’s leaders met inside the European Parliament in Strasbourg where Russia’s military build-up and the threat of war in Ukraine was met with a strong support for strong sanctions against Vladimir Putin.

“Encircling a country with an extraordinary deployment of military forces – never seen before – can only be seen as aggressive and threatening behaviour. This escalation not only endangers the stability and integrity of Ukraine. It also threatens peace and security in Europe, and the rules-based international system,” said European Council president Charles Michel.

Michel said the EU would pursue a large number of diplomatic initiatives and missions with Russia, commending German chancellor Olaf Scholz and French prsident Emmanuel Macron on their role in meeting Putin.

“We have never stopped giving priority to diplomatic channels. Even when these efforts did not seem to produce immediate and tangible results.”

In the last two days, Russia signalled that it may be open to diplomacy in the first signs of a cool-down of the military build-up on Ukraine’s border. The Russian authorities insist they have no aggressive intentions despite annexing part of Ukrainian territory, Crimea, in 2014 and undermining the country’s sovereignty in eastern Ukraine.

EPP leader Manfred Weber, reflecting comments made earlier in the week, said Ukrainians’ desire for democracy was the real threat to Vladimir Putin.

“Many say it’s about the eastern expansion of NATO security interests; I don’t believe that. In the eighties, people went on the streets in Gdansk for peace and democracy – in Dresden, in the Baltics, in Budapest... the fall of the Iron Curtain, communism, and then Maidan in Kiev where people fought for freedom and democracy, and also died, and also some years in Minsk in Belarus... Putin’s biggest threat is a free, democratic Ukraine.”

Weber said Putin only understood “the language of power”, and called for sanctions that would present him with a “clear bill where the costs are high”.

But Weber also said the EPP would not support Germany’s Nordstream 2 pipeline to Russia if violence ensues. “The exclusion of Russian banks from the international financial system is necessary,” he repeated.

S&D leader Iratxe Garcia Perez reflected Weber’s concerns, saying Russia feared that Europe’s social media and democracy would find its way from Maidan, to the Red Square.

“Over eight years have gone by since the revolution in Maidan and people have started their fight for rights and democracy. We in the EU have been the most faithful in supporting Ukraine and defend their sovereignty and territorial integrity.

“The challenge that Russia poses to all Europeans basically gives us an opportunity to strengthen our solidarity and determination, and also to defend our interests. In order to put a halt to Putin’s imperialistic tendencies, we are also going to have to fufil our own obligations.”

Garcia Perez said Europeans could not stay at the sidelines as spectators. “No region around the world has a system of security that is as fair as ours.... we will not allow Putin and his blackmail to bring Europe to its knees.”

Renew leader Stephan Sejourne hailed the courage of Ukrainians and called for the condemnation of Russia’s attempts of destabilisation.