Kaliningrad. Photo credit: George Dolgopsky / commons.wikimedia.org (CC-BY-SA-3.0)
The European Union and Russia have reached the agreement on cargo transit to the Kaliningrad region, the Izvestia newspaper reports. According to high-ranking sources from the Russian side, at the beginning of the month Brussels provided a draft document, which states that it is impossible to prohibit the movement of goods between parts of Russia. The agreement completely satisfied the Russian authorities.
The document states that all transit that goes to Kaliningrad, both by rail and by road, is excluded from the sanctions.
It is planned that Europe will add this point in the next sanctions package. It will be the7th in a row.
Now it remains to persuade Lithuania, since Vilnius is not willing to allow the transit and has not yet agreed to a compromise. At the same time, it is noted that Vilnius does this under the influence of Washington, which puts pressure on Lithuania.
Experts note that Russia has still retained some confidence in Brussels. But in relation to Lithuania, there has been no such attitude for a long time. Vilnius is considered an unpredictable partner.
To date, there have been no signs from Brussels or Vilnius about their readiness to lift sanctions on transit.
As Russkiy Mir
reported, Vilnius decided to stop a transit pass to the Kaliningrad region from June 18 for a number of goods included in the EU sanctions list. According to rough estimates, from 40% to 50% of the goods that were previously transported by trains will not be able to reach the region by rail.
Russkiy Mir
