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Germany, France Pick Individuals in Navalny-Attack Reprisal

Merkel Is Shying Away From Action That Would Really Hurt Putin

Germany and France prepared a list of targets as Europe takes the next steps in its plans to retaliate against Vladimir Putin’s government over the poisoning of Russia’s top opposition leader.

The proposed sanctions will target individuals deemed responsible for the attack as well as an entity involved in the nerve agent that was used on Alexey Navalny, the foreign ministers of the two countries said Wednesday. The joint statement didn’t elaborate on the plans.

Germany, France Pick Individuals in Navalny-Attack Reprisal

Although countermeasures are all but inevitable, the European Union action may be largely symbolic, consisting of asset freezes and travel bans for Russian officials, according to officials familiar with the discussions. The almost-completed Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline between Russia and Germany, Putin’s real weak point, is likely to be spared, the officials said.

Taking action against security officials would have limited impact in Moscow, although it would be “painful” if major business figures and top officials were targeted, said Ivan Timofeev, an expert from the Russian International Affairs Council, a Kremlin-founded research group.

The finding Tuesday by the top global chemical-weapons watchdog that a banned nerve agent from the Novichok family had been used against Navalny puts the onus on EU policymakers to take action against Putin.

‘No Other Course’

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said on Wednesday that the Russian government has so far contributed nothing toward clarifying the Navalny affair beyond “absurd accusations,” such as the opposition leader having poisoned himself. Without a satisfactory explanation from Russia, “there will be no other course than to present a clear and explicit international reaction,” Maas told lawmakers in the Bundestag Wednesday.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry attacked Germany and France, accusing them of leading an “anti-Russian coalition” in a website statement. It also criticized the chemical weapons watchdog based in The Hague for “sabotaging” Russian demands for information on the investigation into the poisoning of Navalny.

The near-fatal attack on Navalny, who is recovering in Berlin, has returned the focus to Russia’s history of aggression since Putin seized the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine in 2014. Chancellor Angela Merkel telegraphed the personal importance of the issue by visiting Navalny in the hospital shortly after he woke from a medically induced coma.

German prosecutors say the Russian government was also to blame for a cyberattack on the Bundestag five years ago and a gangland-style killing in a Berlin city park in 2019. The trial for the murder began Wednesday in the German capital.

Even though German officials are firmly convinced the attack on Navalny was ordered from the top, it may not be enough to persuade them to ditch the incremental approach that has frustrated allies like the U.S.

European officials have been drawing a distinction between the Navalny affair and the 2018 poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, which triggered the coordinated expulsion of more than 150 Russian diplomats.

Exercise in Compromise

The Skripal attack took place on British soil, whereas Navalny fell violently ill on a domestic Russian flight to Moscow, the officials said. That may well mean a lesser response since officials are aiming to calibrate their action to ensure it’s legally airtight.

Also, veto powers that all 27 EU member states have over foreign policy makes agreeing on sanctions an exercise in compromise, which could take the teeth out of any response.

The entity targeted by Europe could very well be one of a number of Russian government scientific institutes that were already hit with U.S. sanctions in August.

Personal sanctions against military-intelligence officers and other individuals suspected to be involved would have little effect, since such agents rarely travel openly outside of Russia.

Putin’s Pressure Point

Nord Stream 2, the controversial Gazprom project that is set to double the amount of Russian gas directly to Germany under the Baltic Sea, is probably off the table. The tumultuous debate in Berlin over whether the pipeline should be called into question was effectively quashed by Merkel, who said potential sanctions must be decided on the EU level.

Russia will also be given a window of opportunity to take its own action after Merkel and others demanded a full investigation. But Moscow says it has no evidence that Navalny was poisoned and officials have called the case a set-up by western security services.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.