BRUSSELS — European Union governments agreed Thursday to add 13 Ukrainian separatists and five organizations to the bloc's sanctions list, diplomats said.
Ambassadors from the 28 EU countries meeting on Thursday targeted the separatists with asset freezes and travel bans and the organizations with asset freezes because of their "involvement in action undermining Ukraine's territorial integrity," an EU source said.
The names were kept secret but are expected to be published in the EU's Official Journal on Saturday. The organizations targeted are mainly political groups rather than companies, diplomats said.
The decision swells an EU sanctions list over Ukraine that already covers 119 people and 23 entities.
EU governments are also discussing proposals for an "enhanced ban" on investments in Crimea as part of the EU's policy of refusing to recognize Russia's annexation of the Ukrainian region in March.
EU foreign ministers meeting last week asked officials to put more Ukrainian separatists under sanctions after pro-Russian rebels elected a separatist leadership in eastern Ukraine on Nov. 2 in a vote President Petro Poroshenko called "a farce."
Diplomats say there is little appetite among EU member states to step up economic sanctions against Russia, the bloc's leading energy supplier, over its involvement in the Ukraine crisis.
