On 21 December 2017, the Council prolonged economic sanctions targeting specific sectors of the Russian economy until 31 July 2018. The sanctions target target the financial, energy and defence sectors, and the area of dual-use goods.
The economic sanctions prolonged by this decision include:
- limiting access to EU primary and secondary capital markets for 5 major Russian majority state-owned financial institutions and their majority-owned subsidiaries established outside of the EU, as well as three major Russian energy and three defence companies
- imposing an export and import ban on trade in arms
- establishing an export ban for dual-use goods for military use or military end users in Russia
- curtailing Russian access to certain sensitive technologies and services that can be used for oil production and exploration
