Earlier this week, the European Council agreed to keep sanctions on Russia for another six months. In the run-up to the vote, there was talk of trying to extend the sanctions by a full year, but that was quickly shot down by the usual suspects. RFE/RL:
“We had a discussion that luckily ended without considering the option – which would have been wrong, I think – to react to the situation in Syria and Aleppo with EU sanctions against Russia,” Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said after an EU summit in Brussels on Dec. 15.
