The European Union on Friday formally adopted its fifth package of sanctions against Russia since the country's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, including bans on the import of coal, wood, chemicals and other products.
The measures also prevent many Russian vessels and trucks from accessing the EU, further crippling trade, and will ban all transactions with four Russian banks, including the VTB bank.
The ban on coal imports will be fully effective from the second week of August. No new contracts can be signed starting Friday when sanctions are to be published in the EU's official journal.
Existing contracts will have to be terminated by the second week of August, meaning that Russia can continue to receive payments from the EU on coal exports until then.
"These latest sanctions were adopted following the atrocities committed by Russian armed forces in Bucha and other places under Russian occupation," the EU's top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said in a statement.
The Kremlin has said that Western allegations that Russian forces committed war crimes by executing civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha were a "monstrous forgery" aimed at denigrating the Russian army.
The commission estimated the coal ban alone to be worth 8 billion euros ($8.7 billion) a year in lost revenues for Russia. That is twice as big as the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen had said Tuesday.
In addition to coal, the new EU sanctions ban imports from Russia of many other commodities and products, including wood, rubber, cement, fertilizers, high-end seafood, such as caviar, and spirits, such as vodka, for a total additional value estimated in 5.5 billion euros ($5.9 billion) a year.
The EU also restricted the export of a number of products to Russia, including jet fuel, quantum computers, advanced semiconductors, high-end electronics, software, sensitive machinery and transportation equipment, for a total value of 10 billion euros a year.
The sanctions also forbid Russian companies from participating in public procurement in the EU and extend prohibitions on using cryptocurrencies that are considered a potential means to circumvent sanctions.
The commission said that another 217 people were added to the EU blacklist as part of the new sanctions package, meaning their assets in the EU will be frozen and subject to travel bans in the EU.
Most of them are political leaders of the separatist regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, but the sanctions also hit top businesspeople, politicians and military staff close to the Kremlin.
Close to 900 people have been sanctioned by the EU since the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which Moscow calls a "special operation" to demilitarize and "denazify" the country.
