Brussels November 10 (Europe Press) –
The European Union on Monday accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of continuing to “terrorize” Ukraine with continued attacks on its energy infrastructure, and said it would apply additional sanctions to force Russia to stop its aggression and sit down for peace talks with Kiev.
“Once again, President Putin continues to instill fear in Ukrainians. What we see with these attacks is that he is targeting critical energy infrastructure, including the substations that supply energy to nuclear power plants,” EU foreign affairs spokeswoman Anitta Hipper said at a press conference from the Community’s capital.
In this sense, the country denounced the attacks on substations that took place from Friday to early Saturday morning, disrupting electricity, water and heating services and “putting nuclear safety at risk.” This Sunday, the Khmelnytsky and Rivne nuclear power plants in western Ukraine confirmed that they had to reduce production levels due to Russian attacks.
In the face of this, the EU remains committed to future sanctions to support Ukraine in both the energy and military sectors, Hipper elaborated, suggesting that the EU will continue its contacts with like-minded countries to “mobilize more support to sustain Ukraine’s energy sector.”
Regarding the upcoming 20th wave of sanctions, which the European Commission has not yet announced, “we are continually working with new methods and means to increase the pressure on President Putin and ensure that he comes to the negotiating table,” he said.
Russia has stepped up its attacks in recent weeks, with a particular focus on the city of Pokrovsk, one of the few Ukrainian strongholds in the Donetsk region. The mining and industrial town, a communications hub, is one of the few cities in the Donbas region that are controlled by Kiev.
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