The European Commission`s Spokeswoman answered question about the EU`s removal of the port of Kulevi from the sanctions list.

"The Kulevi Port had been identified because of its interactions with shadow fleet vessels visiting the port and concerns that it could be used for the re-export of Russian oil in breach of our sanctions. So, this is why the EU`s sanctions envoy had received the commitments from the Georgian authorities that activities which were of concern to the EU would cease…

The Georgian Foreign Minister committed that no shadow fleet tanker would be permitted to call at its ports. We also received additional commitments from SOCAR, the state oil and Gas Company of Azerbaijan that operates the port itself.

So we, as with all sanctions and possible circumvention, monitor abherence to those commitments, and we will not shy away from taking any further measures if we see actors actively undermining the impact of our sanctions.

As I said last week, the Georgian authorities have confirmed that they would cease these re-exports. We continue to closely monitor that it is happening in practice", - said Siobhan McGarry.

When asked whether the re-export meant that Russian oil was entering the territory of Georgia and then being exported to the EU, she said: "I do not have the details of the case, but I would imagine that was what was happening, that the oil was being re-exported to the EU".