Moscow - Australian Ambassador to Russia Paul Myler has conditioned a possible alleviation of Australia's sanctions on Russia on a change of the Russian policy towards Ukraine.
“If Russia stops doing that [as regards Ukraine] then obviously we would have to look at rolling back some of the sanctions. Everybody has been very clear, there are no permanent sanctions, we want to be rolling aback, we want to be removing them, but we have to see real evidence of change and it needs to be implemented and committed to and seen through before we can consider them,” the ambassador said in an interview with Interfax.
He added that a complete lift of sanctions could not be expected because of the Crimea situation. “That is very difficult to see how we could remove the sanctions if Crimea remains part of Russia,” the ambassador stated.
At the same time, he stressed that cooperation between Russia and Australia might resume before the lift of sanctions.
“You make a decision to cooperate and afterwards we make decisions about lifting sanctions. We don’t lift sanctions and then hope that you cooperate. Russia needs to make a decision about how it is going to interact with the international community,” the ambassador said.
The Australian government expanded sanctions on Russia in the field of defense, finance and the oil and gas sector on Sept. 1, the Australian television and radio broadcaster ABC said.
It said the measures included a ban on exports of armaments and oil and gas equipment to Russia, the limited access of Russian state banks to the Australian capital market and a ban on investment in Crimea and trade with that republic.
Targeted financial sanctions are tightened and the list of individuals banned from traveling to Australia is expanded, ABC said.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott noted that the measures matched the EU policy.
