Italy's Prime Minister Matteo Renzi talks to the media as he leaves a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium, October 21, 2016.REUTERS/Francois Lenoir
European Union leaders condemned Russia on Friday for
its bombing of civilians in Syria's besieged city of Aleppo but faced
resistance from Italy to impose new sanctions against Moscow over the
atrocities.
Horrified by Russian air strikes on hospitals and an
aid convoy that have killed hundreds of civilians including children, Britain,
France and Germany want maximum pressure on Moscow to stop its assault on
rebels in eastern Aleppo.
Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, whose country has
broad trade ties with Russia, said economic sanctions should not be part of
that strategy because they would not force Moscow to negotiate a peace
settlement.
"We should do everything possible for a peace
deal in Syria but it's difficult to imagine that this should be linked to
further sanctions on Russia," Renzi told reporters after a late-night
dinner in Brussels where the bloc discussed strategy.
With no military role in the Syrian civil war, the
European Union is relying on its neutral status to help the United Nations to
end the near 5-1/2-year Syrian conflict, anxious to be seen to be active.
France has sought to isolate Russia diplomatically,
first at the United Nations Security Council in New York with a failed bid to
force a ceasefire and then with a formal condemnation by all 28 EU foreign
ministers this week of Russia's strikes in rebel-held eastern Aleppo.
European leaders followed up with equally strong
language in their summit statement in the early hours of Friday. But the final
version removed wording seen by Reuters in earlier drafts threatening sanctions
on Russian individuals and companies linked to Syrian President Bashar
al-Assad.
"ALL OPTIONS"
Russia's intervention in the Syria conflict a year ago
has turned the tide of the war in Assad's favor. The recapture of Aleppo,
Syria's biggest city before the war, is now Moscow's goal, seemingly at any
cost, diplomats said.
French President Francois Hollande, who held
late-night talks on Wednesday in Berlin with Russian leader Vladimir Putin and
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, insisted that sanctions had not been
completely ruled out.
"All the options are open as long as the truce is
not respected and as long as there is a will to crush a city," Hollande
said of Aleppo, where some 275,000 people are trapped and hundreds of people
have been killed since a ceasefire agreed by Moscow and Washington broke down.
Russia has told the United Nations it will stop
bombing eastern Aleppo for 11 hours a day for four days, an announcement that
EU officials speculated was timed to coincide with the EU summit in Brussels
and as momentum was building to impose more crippling sanctions on the Kremlin.
As the EU leaders discussed their options over dinner,
a fleet of Russian warships carrying fighter bombers made its way along
Europe's western coast towards Syria. It is a naval operation that NATO
believes is likely to intensify the assault on Aleppo, despite the Russian
ceasefire pledge.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said he was
seriously concerned about the fleet, saying: "This may be used to increase
attacks on Aleppo ... to increase human suffering," Stoltenberg told
reporters.
Merkel who earlier denounced the air strikes on Aleppo
as "completely inhuman" said that she would do all she could to
extend the ceasefire. She also said sanctions were still an option. "If
the intensity of the bombing that we've seen in recent days continues, then
that would be a reason for us to think about what we do next," she told
Reuters.
UKRAINE TROUBLES
Russia, with a weak rouble and an economy in
recession, is feeling the impact of European Union and U.S. sanctions on the
country's financial, energy and defense sectors imposed over Moscow's
annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its support for separatists in Ukraine.
More sanctions on Russia would be unlikely to have
much of an economic hit but could further worsen ties with Moscow.
Highlighting those tensions, European Council
President Donald Tusk, who chaired the summit, accused Russia of trying to
weaken the European Union, saying leaders were worried about Russian
hostilities ranging from airspace violations to disinformation campaigns and
cyber attacks.
"Given these examples, it is clear that Russia's
strategy is to weaken the EU," he said.
Adding to the EU's problems in the region, Dutch Prime
Minister Mark Rutte told leaders at the end of the dinner that he was not
optimistic of reaching a deal over a partnership agreement between the European
Union and Ukraine, which was rejected by Dutch voters in a referendum in April.
Western efforts to pull the former Soviet nation out
of Moscow's grasp with the free-trade deal have been complicated by the Dutch
vote.
"On the one hand a Dutch 'no' could potentially
have an effect on the region, on the other hand I do not want the Dutch voter
to feel cheated," Rutte told a press briefing in Brussels.
Rutte added he would continue to negotiate behind the
scenes to get an agreement in the Dutch parliament, as well as with Ukrainian
and European leaders.
(Additional reporting by Robert-Jan Bartunek, Noah
Barkin, Alastair Macdonald, Philip Bleninsop, Jan Strupczewski)
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