HELSINKI, September 12. /ITAR-TASS/. Finnish Prime Minister Alexander Stubb said on Friday he hoped the EU would revise sanctions against Russia in several weeks’ time, the Helsinki-base media said on Friday quoting him.

While taking the floor in the national parliament, Stubb said the EU would assess implementation of the plans for peaceful settlement of the armed conflict in Eastern Ukraine at the end of this month.

Prior to the imposition of a third package of sanctions on Russia, which took place on Friday, EU officials stressed on a number of occasions that the restrictive measures against Russia were revisable depending on the progress of peace settlement between the West-backed government in Kiev and the Eastern-Ukrainian pro-federalization forces.

Stubb said that the EU would do a review of the situation in Ukraine in three weeks’ time and he hoped there would be an opportunity then to lift the restrictive measures.

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said upon the end of EU ambassadorial consultations on Thursday the EU was introducing a new package of sanctions against Russia and was banning the issuance of loans to three largest Russian defense-manufacturing corporations and three companies in the fuels and energy sector.

Also, the EU banned the market trading of bonds and other securities of these companies with maturity periods longer than thirty days and the issuance of their securities into market circulation.

A total of nine defense manufacturers have fallen under a ban on exports of dual technologies to them.

The EU introduced restrictions on access to the money markets for five Russian state-owned banks, which Van Rompuy did not name either. In addition, EU companies have been prohibited to do deepwater drilling for the Russian oil industry, as well as to develop deposits in Russia’s Arctic areas and deposits of shale oil.

The latter sanction, however, does not cover service agreements in natural gas production.

EU decision-makers have again expanded the list of personalities who will face restrictions on obtaining EU travel visas and whose banking assets will be frozen, should any such assets be found in the banks of the union’s twenty-eight members-states.

An official announcement on the sanctions was published in the EU official journal on Friday.