The Times reported on Tuesday that the UK is officially designating Russia’s Wagner Group as a terrorist organization to increase pressure on Russia.
On Tuesday, France’s National Assembly unanimously passed a resolution calling for the inclusion of the Russian Wagner Group, accused of committing abuses in Ukraine and Africa, on the EU’s list of terrorist organizations.
The non-binding text calls on the French government to “mobilize diplomatically” for the European Union to accept this demand, which would allow more effective sanctions against members of the Wagner group and its supporters, especially financially.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed the initiative, saying: “This is what the whole world must accept” and adding: “Every terrorist phenomenon must be eliminated and every terrorism must be condemned.”
The proposal, made by an MP from the presidential party En Nahda, led by President Emmanuel Macron, specifically targets the “many violations committed against civilians” in Ukraine by this group of mercenaries, some of which may amount to “war crimes.”
Representative Benjamin Haddad said: “The activities of the Wagner group fit the European definition of terrorism”, calling it “an army of chaos”, noting that it supports “Russia under the leadership of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin” and its members sow “instability and violence”.
In addition to Ukraine, the resolution, voted on by opposition MPs from the right, the left and the far right, points to abuses attributed to Wagner in Syria and other African countries such as Mali and the Central African Republic.
French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna welcomed the resolution adopted by the National Assembly and listed the sanctions imposed by the European Union on the Wagner Group.
“From a purely legal point of view,” the minister said, “the definition of terrorists has no ‘direct additional effect’, but stressed that ‘the symbolic meaning of such a designation, or the deterrent it may have for countries that may wish to use’, should not be underestimate.
In mid-March, the Lithuanian parliament passed a resolution classifying the Wagner Group as a “terrorist organization”, which was approved by Kiev.
At the end of March, French deputies expressed support for Ukraine by adopting a resolution that classified the Holodomor, a famine organized by the Soviet government that led to the death of millions of people.
