Polish PM praises EU unity after ninth package of sanctions adopted

Mateusz Morawiecki, the Polish prime minister, said that the ninth package of sanctions adopted by the European Council shows the reliability and unity of the EU.

EU leaders agreed in Brussels on Thursday a ninth package of sanctions against Russia for waging the war against Ukraine. New sanctions would blacklist nearly 200 more people and bar investment in Russia's mining industry, among others.

"The sanctions show, on the one hand, that we are reliable, and, on the other hand, that we have maintained the unity of member states," Morawiecki told reporters after the meeting and added that Russia wanted to exhaust and divide the EU. "We have not allowed this to happen," he said.

"We have also introduced a ban on investments in the Russian mining sector," Morawiecki continued. According to him, these new sanctions were a very significant form of pressure on Russia.

Having admitted that the EU wanted to achieve it as soon as possible, Morawiecki said that "peace must be good and victorious for Ukraine and Europe.

"But good peace must not mean the destruction of Ukraine and Russia's victory," he concluded.

Referring to the adoption of a global minimum corporate tax, the prime minister said that the version approved on Thursday "is good and beneficial to Poland."