The European Union's decision to resume the issuance of licenses to export special and military equipment to Ukraine goes against the EU's regulations on controlling exports of military technologies, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
“We have noticed that, during the recent Council of the European Union meeting in Brussels, the leaders of the EU member-states quietly agreed on lifting restrictions on exports of gear to Ukraine that can be used for internal repressions. Exports of military technologies and equipment have also been allowed,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a commentary available on its website on Saturday.
“Not only is the Council of the European Union’s decision permeated with double standards, but it also goes against the rules of control of exports of military technologies and equipment adopted by the European Union itself,” it said.
The restrictions that remained in effect earlier had been introduced by the Council of the European Union on February 20, 2014, that is, “when President Viktor Yanukovych was in office and when bitter clashes between armed national-radicals and virtually unarmed law enforcement bodies were continuing on Maidan. Then the European Union considered it wrong to ship special gear and weapons to ‘Yanukovych’s regime’,” the Foreign Ministry said.
“But now, without regard to the military operation being continued by the incumbent Kyiv authorities in the southeastern part of the country, the EU has found fit to fully resume the issuance of licenses to export special gear and military equipment. It is understandable why the EU is carefully hushing up the undeniable facts of firing upon Russian territory from Ukrainian territory: the prospect of feeling its own involvement in such activities probably causes Brussels some discomfort,” it said.
“We are once again urging our EU counterparts to use common sense rather than be guided by opportunistic reasons and goads from Washington. The decision on restricting shipments of weapons and special equipment to Ukraine should have been made after the start of the so-called antiterrorist operation in Donbas and the Luhansk region. But it is not late yet to reinstate the relevant ban now. Without it, the European Union’s responsibility for the continued bloodshed in southeastern Ukraine will be increasing,” the Foreign Ministry said.
