Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin says Ukraine is preparing a new package of sanctions against Russia because of the Russian president's decree on simplifying the procedure for issuing Russian passports to residents of the temporarily occupied areas of Donbas, eastern Ukraine.
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"Ukrainian diplomats are now actively working on creating a new wave of political pressure on the Russian Federation, as well as preparing additional Ukrainian sanctions against Russia, both sectoral and economic ones," he told a Ukrainian TV channel on April 26, the ministry wrote on Twitter.
According to Klimkin, Ukraine will insist on imposing not personal sanctions, as was the case with Russia's aggression in the Kerch Strait, but on tougher sectoral or economic restrictions.
The minister added that the sanctions could be slapped on "people and companies that form the basis of the Kremlin regime."
As UNIAN reported earlier, on April 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on the simplified procedure for issuing Russian passports to residents of the temporarily occupied Donbas.
The Kremlin explained that Putin made such a decision "to protect human and civil rights and freedoms," on the basis of "generally accepted principles and norms of international law."
In this regard, President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko has called on the European Union to step up sanctions against Russia during the next review of the existing regime scheduled for June.
