Ian Austin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Austin on 2016-04-27.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, whether the Government plans to impose financial sanctions on Russian individuals complicit in human rights abuses.

Mr David Lidington

EU sanctions have been imposed on Russia for its illegal annexation of Crimea and ongoing aggression and destabilisation of eastern Ukraine. The UK Government supports human rights defenders and holds the Russian Government to account, publicly and privately, when it fails to fulfil its international commitments to promote and protect human rights. For these reasons Russia also featured as a Priority Country in the annual FCO Human Rights Report released in April 2016. I also raised human rights issues with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Titov on my last visit to Moscow in December 2015.