European foreign ministers are discussing next week how to respond to the arrest of the Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny and the EU has tools to use even if some member states are reluctant to sanction Moscow, Lithuania's Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis has told BBC Radio.
“I would hope that the EU doesn't linger. Next week, we're having a foreign ministers' council and I'm pretty sure we will have a debate on how to proceed next,” Landsbergis told the BBC Radio programme The World Tonight.
Read more: Lithuania calls for EU sanctions against Russia after Navalny's arrest
Navalny was arrested upon landing in Moscow last Sunday. The following day, a makeshift court hearing at a police station handed the Kremlin critic a 30-day sentence. Navalny called the process a “mockery of justice”.
Baltic ministers were among the first to call on the European Union to respond to Navalny's arrest.
Berlin and Paris have blocked proposals for a more explicit threat of sanctions on Russia in a joint EU statement. However, according to Landsbergis, the so-called “European Magnitsky Law” allows the European Commission to proceed even without “a broad political consensus”.
“[Sanctions] would be applied to the people who could be proven to have participated in the arrest, in the mock trial of Mr Navalny, and I think this is the course of action that is not that difficult to start,” the Lithuanian foreign minister told the BBC.
Asked whether Russia's actions could force Germany to reconsider its joint energy projects, such as the Nord Stream 2 pipeline underneath the Baltic Sea, Landsbergis said that President Vladimir Putin's actions may leave Berlin no other choice.
“I think that Mr Putin is doing everything in order for Germany to reconsider its course of action,” he said. “If Mr Putin doesn't deviate from his course, there's hope in the future [that Germany will abandon Nord Stream 2].”
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