Latvia calls on EU to designate Russia as state sponsor of terrorism

The European Union should stop issuing tourist visas to Russians and officially recognize Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism.

Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics said this on Twitter, Ukrinform reports.

"The EU must consider Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. I repeat the proposal to impose an EU tourist visa ban for Russian citizens," Rinkevics said.

He condemned "the brutal murder of Ukrainian POWs by the Russian Armed Forces in Olenivka and ongoing atrocities committed by the Russian military against Ukraine."

Earlier reports said that Ukrainian law enforcement officers had opened a criminal investigation into the shelling by Russian troops of a prison in Olenivka, Donetsk region, which killed about 40 people and injured 130.

According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the Russian military deliberately fired at a prison in Olenivka, which housed Ukrainian prisoners of war.

According to Ukrainian intelligence, mercenaries from the Wagner private military company carried out the murder of Ukrainian prisoners of war in the temporarily captured town of Olenivka.