Assyrian Democratic Organization ADO
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BRUSSELS – The EU is to slap fresh sanctions against Syria on Saturday, including a ban on investments in the oil sector and on delivering bank notes and coins made in Europe, diplomats said Wednesday.
The sanctions due to come into effect on Saturday will be the seventh round of European Union measures targeting President Bashar al-Assad’s regime for its unrelenting crackdown on dissent.
Experts from the 27 EU member states have agreed in principle to also target six firms and two individuals "directly linked to the regime" who are part of Assad’s "inner circle," according to a diplomat.
A television station allegedly involved in spreading propaganda is among the firms targeted as the EU widens its actions against the regime.
The others include two telecommunications firms and three companies supplying clothing and other goods to the military, the sources said.
The ban on new investment in the oil sector would also target Syrian companies active abroad and seek to halt all loans, purchases or joint ventures, another diplomat said.
The halt on delivery of bank notes printed in Europe concerns Austrian, German and Belgium companies that print money for the Syrian central bank.
French oil giant Total is one of the biggest foreign companies present in Syria, alongside Anglo-Dutch Shell and China’s CNPC.
Total, whose Syrian activities continue despite the conflict, extracted 14,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Syria in 2010, and the equivalent of 25,000 barrels per day of natural gas — 1.6 percent of its total production.
Earlier this month, the EU adopted a ban on crude oil imports, designed to hit hard at Damascus as the EU buys 95 percent of Syria’s oil exports, providing a third of the regime’s hard currency earnings.
The new sanctions come as President Barack Obama called in New York for UN Security Council sanctions on Syria, saying there was no excuse for inaction when people were being tortured and murdered by their government.
In Geneva, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said over 2,700 people have been killed in Syria’s bloody crackdown on protesters.
Source: Middle East Online
