“We proposed including Kulevi on the sanctions list as part of the sanctions package. As you know, we are negotiating with the owners of the oil refinery, who have committed to diversifying away from Russian oil,” European Commission spokesperson Siobhan McGarry said in response to a question from Euroscope regarding the inclusion of the Kulevi oil refinery and cryptocurrency-related platforms in the EU’s 21st sanctions package.

“We want these commitments to be fulfilled. That is why we allowed this six-month delay, to give the owners an opportunity to diversify away from Russian oil. If the Commission assesses that these commitments have been fulfilled, they will be removed from the list. If not, we will propose to the Council that they remain on the list. This is our position regarding Kulevi,” the European Commission spokesperson said.

Regarding the question about cryptocurrency, she said she did not have data on the number of Georgian platforms listed in the package.

“There were 14 in total, some of which are Georgian. In this package, we are actually proposing several measures related to cryptocurrency. First, we have individually listed several platforms that, in our view, are systematically used to circumvent our sanctions and enable Russia to transfer money in violation of our sanctions. Clearly, we want to put an end to this type of behavior.

“In addition, we have introduced a new measure that will allow us, at a later stage, to list a country where, in our assessment, cryptocurrency platforms used to circumvent sanctions are more systematically located, and we will be able to propose that country for transaction restrictions. They would consequently be removed from the SWIFT system. This will clearly be a fairly strong deterrent, which is precisely what we want to achieve. We want behavior to change.

“We have not yet activated this mechanism against any specific third country, but we have included it in our package and are ready to activate it if necessary. Of course, we are not targeting any particular country, but I would like to emphasize that we have been working very actively on all sanctions packages and have strengthened measures against financial institutions in each package,” the European Commission spokesperson said.