EU Sanctions effects on Russia contra Belarus

Abstract: What pressure tools are available in conflicts between countries and when flagrant violationsof political rights and civil liberties occur in a country? There is no absolute answer to whattools are best used. Economic sanctions have been used for a very long time and after WorldWar II sanctions have developed as a tool for different situations and have become targetedinstead of more general as before. In this essay I have focused on the EU sanctions against Russia and Belarus. First of all, whatkind of sanctions has the EU issued and why? Second, how have the sanctions affected theparties involved? Knowing that the effectiveness of sanctions is documented to be limited, itis interesting to study the EU sanctions against Russia and Belarus, two states that both havebeen part of the former Soviet Union and that have had working relationships with the EUafter the fall of the Berlin Wall. The objective of this research has been to examine andcompare the EU sanctions in these two separate cases. My aim has been to analyse theunderlying causes, effects and yielded results of the EU sanctions against these two states. My sources have been limited to what is written in english and swedish and I have used thecurrently existing research on sanctions for my research. With a starting point from the EU it is clear that the sanctions have been well-balanced, but Ican not find that the sanctions have had the effect on the targeted states the EU is seeking for.Instead, the sanctions, along with other events, have taken Russia and Belarus in a different direction with stronger bonds to each other but also to China.