Lithuania's prime minister says how new sanctions will affect transit to Kaliningrad

In December this year, the list of sanctioned goods that cannot be transported to the Kaliningrad region through the territory of Lithuania will increase. This was stated by the Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė, according to the newspaper RuBaltic.ru.

,,At the beginning of December, the list will become longer and, I think, 15% of goods transported from Russia to Kaliningrad will be affected by sanctions’’, said the head of the Vilnius government.

The bans on the transport of Russian oil and oil products through Lithuania in transit to the Russian enclave will take effect on December 5 or February 5, 2023, depending on the specific commodity code.

,,Kaliningrad, Transnistria and Karabakh are the three sore points of Russia, of which it is constantly reminded, as soon as the illusion returns that everything is limited only to Ukraine. By the end of the year, Lithuania will increase the list of sanctioned goods prohibited for transport from the entire range of goods. It may not be such a dire situation, as Russia has long ago worked out the logistics of all the goods the enclave needs by sea. But it certainly sounds like a political statement about possibilities and intentions’’, says Aleksandr Nosovich, a political scientist from Kaliningrad.

On 13 July this year, the European Commission allowed Russia to transport sanctioned goods (especially steel and ferrous metals) to and from Kaliningrad via Lithuania only for the needs of this enclave and only by rail, but the volumes must be consistent with the average of the goods taken on the railway for the last three years.