The European Union agreed to institute sanctions against two European neighbors:  Russia, for the poisoning of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko for election misconduct and attacking protesters, Politico reports.

The German and French Foreign Ministers led the efforts to impose sanction during the meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg, saying “We have agreed to enact sanctions against individuals that we consider to be responsible for this violation of international law.”

The Russian government allegedly poisoned opposition leader Navalny prior to a flight he took from Siberia to Moscow using a Soviet-era nerve agent called Novichok.  Navalny was transferred to a German hospital for treatment after Russian government officials claimed they found no evidence of a use of a poison on Navalny.

Russian dissidents had been poisoned with Novichok in the past, specifically in the United Kingdom, where one person who incidentally came in contact with the chemical was killed and three others sickened in 2018.

The EU sanctions in Belarus will target Lukashenko and up to 40 others for rigging an August election in which Lukashenko claimed he won 80% of the vote despite substantial reports of irregularities and improper vote tallies.

Lukashenko has also ordered the repression of protests around his nation, some of which have attracted 100,000 people, or 1% of the nation’s population, to take to the streets of Minsk, the nation’s capital.