Brussels (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – According to the Financial Times, the European Commission plans to propose reducing the Russian oil price cap and banning Nord Stream infrastructure use as part of new sanctions against Russia.
The European Union is getting ready to roll out a new 18th package of sanctions against Russia, intended to penalize the Nord Stream gas infrastructure and tighten the restrictions on Russian oil exports. The new sanctions package will add to pressure on the economy in Moscow during the ongoing war in Ukraine.
According to the report, which cites three people familiar with the proposal, the package will include reducing the current oil price cap from $60 to $45 per barrel, as well as prohibiting the use of Russian energy infrastructure, including the Nord Stream pipelines.
What sectors will be hit in the 18th package?
The sanctions package will include a ban on the use of Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines, which originally facilitated the transfer of Russian natural gas from the Baltic Sea to Germany. Both pipelines remain inactive after explosions in 2022, but the new sanctions will formally exclude them from the European energy network.
Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, announced a month ago that the European Union is developing a new set of sanctions aimed at stepping up pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin over the ongoing war in Ukraine.
“He does not want peace, so we have to increase the pressure, and this is why we are working on a new package of sanctions,”
Von der Leyen said, referring to Putin.
“This package will include for example sanctions on Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2. It will include working on listing more vessels of the Russian shadow fleet and also lowering the oil price cap, and will include more sanctions on the financial sector in Russia.”
How does this compare to the 17th sanctions round?
On 20 May 2025, the European Union adopted its 17th sanctions package against Russia, signalling a key rise in attempts to undermine Russia’s military capacity and revenue sources from the energy sector.
The EU’s 17th sanctions package against Russia focused on several key entities and represented a significant escalation in the efforts to sabotage Russia’s war economy and military supply chains. At the heart of the measures are 189 newly sanctioned Russian vessels—a combination of oil tanker vessels and support vessels used by Russia to breach sanctions as a means of continuing to export oil from the Russian Federation—bringing the total number of sanctioned vessels to 342.
