The international community should stop and cease developing the spiral of sanctions, which entails an increase in tensions, resulting in violence and the deaths of innocent people. This statement was made by former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.
"In this conflict, all sides have made mistakes that led to a spiral of threats, sanctions and the use of violence. Now we need to leave this spiral. Minsk-2 shows that it is in the interests of all the participants, and that no one questions the territorial integrity Ukraine," RIA Novosti cites his words in an interview with Spiegel.
"The big mistake by the Europeans, including the government of Germany, was that they assumed that the head of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso, had held talks on an association agreement with Ukraine only, and not with Russia. Although everyone knew that Ukraine is a country that is not united in terms of culture," Schroeder stated his point of view.
Thus, according to the politician, the key problem which provoked the political crisis in Ukraine a year ago, is the question of how to combine Kiev's status as a country associated with the EU with membership in the Eurasian Economic Union, which could be, if not resolved, at least mitigated earlier.
Representatives of European business have also repeatedly talked about the dangers of the sanctions regime. Thus, the number of jobs in Europe since the introduction of sanctions has fallen by 1 million. The chairman of the Association of European Businesses (AEB) Philip Pegorier reported on this on March 26, at the Northern Dimension Forum.
"It is necessary that new sanctions are not imposed, and by July of this year in relation to the sanctions regime some favorable decision should be adopted," the agency Business News quotes Pegorier.
At the moment, the EU sanctions against Russia have been extended until 15 September.
