Latvian MEP Sandra Kalniete submitted the draft report on the state of EU-Russia political relations for the European Parliament’s consideration. It has been published on the EP official website.
In the motion for a EP resolution, Kalniete advanced a proposal to terminate the EU-Russia Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) which was signed in 1994 and came into effect in 1997.
The author gives numerous reasons for breaking the agreement, including Russian intervention in Syria; restrictions on fundamental freedoms and extensive human rights violations in Russia; discrimination against the Tatar minority in occupied Crimea; cyber attacks and assassinations on European soil carried out by Russian intelligence agents using chemical weapons; the organisation of illegal and illegitimate elections in Donbas, etc.
According to the document, Russia and the EU will remain key economic partners in the foreseeable future, but Nord Stream 2 reinforces EU dependency on Russian gas supplies, threatens the EU internal market and is not in line with EU energy policy, and therefore needs to be stopped.
The European Parliament will consider the draft report in March, 2019.
