Bulgaria has confirmed that Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) has been excluded from the 21st package of EU sanctions against Russia and Belarus. The country does not object to the remaining items in the sanctions package.
This was stated by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria Velislava Petrova-Chamova.
According to her, sanctions should cause more harm to Russia than to EU member states and have an economic aspect. Petrova-Chamova also believes that sanctions are not "an assessment of the personality of the Russian patriarch".
“When we start interfering in areas that have nothing to do with the economic consequences for Russia, but concern politically sensitive issues in different countries, as in the case of Bulgaria, then sanctions become counterproductive. That is why we had reservations about including Patriarch Kirill on the list. I am glad that our partners took them into account and excluded him from the package,” she said.
The Bulgarian Foreign Minister clarified that two more EU countries oppose some other provisions of the 21st sanctions package.
- On July 3, Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev said that the country would not support the 21st package of European Union sanctions against Russia unless Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church and Lukoil co-founder Vagit Alekperov were removed from it.
- However, on July 10, they stated that they would not use their veto power to block the sanctions package, although they have reservations about a number of points.
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