Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up UNITED NATIONS, Sept 21 (Reuters) – European Union foreign ministers agreed on Wednesday to prepare new sanctions on Russia and increase arms deliveries to Kyiv after President Vladimir Putin ordered the country’s first mobilization since World War II to to fight in Ukraine. The bloc’s 27 foreign ministers are in New York for the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Putin’s announcement – which included moves to annex Ukrainian territory and a threat to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia – showed panic and desperation. read more Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up “It is clear that Putin is trying to destroy Ukraine,” Borrell told reporters after ministers met to decide how to respond. After being briefed by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, the ministers agreed to task their teams with preparing an eighth package of sanctions that would target “more relevant sectors of the Russian economy and continue to target individuals responsible for the war of aggression in Ukraine.” Borel said. . EU ministers will hold their next formal meeting in mid-October, when a sanctions package could be formalised. The ministers also agreed to increase arms supplies to Ukraine. Borrell declined to elaborate on the type of sanctions or military support, but said he believed there would be “unanimous” support within the bloc for new measures. Speaking in an interview with Reuters, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu said Putin was trying to scare and divide the West, but his latest comments were a “game-changing moment”. Wednesday’s meeting should emphasize unity, move quickly on a new sanctions package and use the European peacekeeping facility’s financing mechanism to increase arms supplies to Ukraine, he said. “We should also declare a commitment to legal responsibility. The fuhrers in the Kremlin should not take it for granted that their responsibility for the genocidal war should be taken lightly,” he said. Maintaining unity among the 27 over a sanctions package could prove tricky amid an energy supply crisis that has hit the bloc hard. Hungary on Tuesday rejected the idea. “It’s different now,” Reinsalu said. “There’s a saying in aviation that the regulations are written in the blood of the victims of plane crashes. Well, all the (sanctions) packages are written in the blood and the atrocities that Russia has committed.” Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up Reporting by Michelle Nichols and John Irish. edited by Jonathan Oatis and Richard Pullin Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
