Putin imposes retaliatory sanctions on Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed an Oct. 23
decree imposing sanctions on Ukrainian individuals and entities in direct response
to sanctions imposed in June. The decree orders the Council of Ministers of
Russia to determine the list of individuals and enterprises to be targeted with
the retaliatory sanctions, as well as determine their conditions.

Recall, Ukrainian President Poroshenko imposed
sanctions in June targeting 14 Russian individuals and 30 entrepreneurs in
response to the role of Russian security services in global cyberattacks. Among
those targeted was Russian billionaire Arkady Rotenberg. As a result, the Ukraine’s
sanctions list against Russia grew to 1,759 individuals and 786 entrepreneurs.

Zenon Zawada: Russia is
engaged in a game of imposing retaliatory sanctions against the U.S., the EU
and Ukraine every time the latter introduce a new round of punishing measures.
While Russia can win this game against Ukraine, whose economy is weak and
vulnerable, it won’t win against the U.S. and the EU.

In order to win against the West, Russia is counting
on populist-nationalist forces to get increasingly elected to European
legislatures to relax sanctions. Though the trends are in Russia’s favor in
Europe, it will take at least another five years, if not a decade, for these
forces to change the EU establishment’s standing towards Russia.

So the Russian economy will have to withstand
intensifying Western sanctions for at least another five years to win this war
against an independent Ukraine. We had been skeptical of Russia’s ability to do
so during the first three years of sanctions and warfare (2014-2017). Now it
seems as though Russia has a chance, particularly with projects such as Nord
Stream 2 and tightening relations with China and Iran.

It’s worth
noting that some of the most active Russian oligarchs in Ukraine, such as Aleksandr
Babakov, have avoided Ukrainian sanctions so far. In particular, Babakov
continues to reap profits from his stakes in numerous regional natural gas
distributors. So Ukrainian sanctions would be more impressive if they targeted
figures like Babakov, or even Ukrainian citizen Dmytro Firtash, who has been
targeted for sanctions related to his Crimean assets but has avoided any damage
to his ties to the Russian gas market.