EU eyes blacklisting airlines over migrant flights, not intimidated by gas threats

Polish service members are seen through a barbed wire fence as hundreds of migrants gather on the Belarusian-Polish border in an attempt to cross it in the Grodno region, Belarus November 10, 2021. Leonid Scheglov/BelTA/Handout via REUTERS

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union will seek to blacklist airlines that transport to Belarus migrants who later attempt to cross the EU border and will coordinate its planned sanctions against Minsk with the United States, the European Commission said on Thursday.

"It is clear to us that sanctions are the response that should be used with the Belarus regime. The (Commission) president has mentioned ...that there will be a proposal to extend the current sanctions," a Commission spokeswoman told a regular news briefing.