MOSCOW (Dispatches) – Russia says the European Union’s latest round of sanctions against Moscow will just exacerbate economic woes within the bloc.
The latest measures, which blacklist nearly 200 more people and bar investment in Russia’s mining industry, are part of the ninth wave of sanctions slapped on Russia since President Vladimir Putin ordered the launch of a “special military operation” in Ukraine on February 24.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova reacted to the measures on Saturday. She said the “current ‘package’ will have the same effect as all the previous ones - exacerbation of socio-economic problems in the European Union itself.”
Zakharova also called on the EU to cancel all restrictions that are having a direct or indirect impact on Russian exports of grains and fertilizers.
Russia’s war on Ukraine started in late February with Moscow saying that it was aimed at defending the pro-Russian population in the eastern Ukrainian regions of Luhansk and Donetsk against persecution by Kiev.
Ever since the beginning of the war, Ukraine’s Western allies, led by the U.S., have been pumping the ex-Soviet Republic full of advanced weapons and slapping Russia with a slew of sanctions, steps Moscow says will only prolong the conflict.
So far during the military conflict, Moscow has seized around a fifth of Ukraine’s expanse in its south and east. It has conditioned negotiations on a possible end to the military campaign on Ukraine’s recognition of Russian rule over the seized territories.
On Saturday, Ukraine was working to restore electricity to hospitals, heating systems and other critical infrastructure in major cities after Russia’s latest wave of attacks on the power grid.
The volley of missiles unleashed Friday pitched multiple cities into darkness, cutting water and heat and forcing people to endure below-freezing temperatures.
In the capital, where the mayor said only a third of residents had heat or water, people wrapped in winter coats crammed into underground metro stations after air raid sirens rang out in the morning.
“I woke up, I saw a rocket in the sky,” Kyiv resident 25-year-old Lada Korovai said. “I saw it and understood that I have to go to the tube.”
Ukraine’s national energy provider imposed emergency blackouts, saying its system had lost more than half its capacity after strikes targeted “backbone networks and generation facilities.”
Ukrenergo warned the extent of the damage in the north, south and center of the country meant it could take longer to restore supplies than after previous attacks.
Russia since October has pursued an aerial onslaught against what Moscow says are military-linked facilities.
But France and the European Union said the suffering inflicted on freezing civilians constitutes war crimes, with the bloc’s foreign policy chief calling the bombings “barbaric.”
Russia fired 74 missiles — mainly cruise missiles — on Friday, 60 of which were shot down by anti-aircraft defenses, according to the Ukrainian army.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the strikes left the capital Kyiv and 14 regions affected by power and water cuts.
Oleksandr Starukh, head of the frontline Zaporizhzhia region, home to Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, said his territory had been targeted by more than a dozen Russian missiles.
Kyiv, meanwhile, withstood one of the biggest missile attacks since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said only 40 percent of residents had electricity and that the metro had stopped running so people could take shelter underground.
With about half of Ukraine’s energy grid damaged, the national operator warned Friday of emergency blackouts.