After Orbán, EU eyes new Russia sanctions push

A second diplomat said there was a growing awareness that the focus of the restrictions needs to be refined. “We need to accept that the sanctions regime isn’t working as it should — there are problems with liquefied natural gas (LNG), there are problems with oil, there are problems with certain trade goods,” the diplomat said.

Yet for a new package to get off the ground, the European Commission, the EU’s Brussels-based executive, first needs to propose the measures to the bloc’s 27 member countries.

“First of all, we need a proposal from the Commission,” a third EU diplomat said. “We can’t blame Hungary if we have nothing to talk about.”

Track and trace

It was no surprise that sanctions momentum came to a halt over the last half year.

In July, the EU’s top diplomat on sanctions, David O’Sullivan, told POLITICO that the next “logical moment” for a fresh sanctions push likely wouldn’t come until the year-end. The EU election had just happened in June, Hungary had just taken over the rotating presidency and a new Commission wouldn’t be in place until fall at the earliest.

Since then, O’Sullivan has stressed the bloc will need to reopen talks about whether to extend its Russia sanctions to EU companies’ foreign subsidiaries — the so-called no-Russia clause. Discussion floundered earlier this year amid an acrimonious standoff between Germany —the bloc’s biggest exporter — and other, less industrial countries.