The EU said on March 24 that it had approved sanctions against senior Belarus officials, including leader Alexander Lukashenko, over a presidential election it condemned as flawed.
The Belarusian Foreign Ministry said, "Such steps are an unfounded, ill-considered, and useless restrictive policy in relation to Belarus."
The EU has proposed banning 31 Belarusian officials from entering its territory, including President Alexander Lukashenko, a diplomatic source in Brussels said Saturday.
The black list of Belarusian officials has to be approved by the foreign ministers of the 25 EU members, who will meet to discuss sanctions on April 10 in Luxembourg.
The ministry said sanctions from the EU would worsen problems with Belarus, and not solve them.
"Belarus urges the EU to refrain from such irresponsible steps, which hold back the proper development of relations," the statement said.
Lukashenko, who Washington has dubbed "Europe's last dictator", was reelected to a third term in the March 19 election with a massive 83% of the vote.
The Belarusian opposition denounced the elections as fraudulent, and staged a sit-in protest on central Oktyabrskaya Square in the capital, Minsk. The rally was broken up after a few days, as was a demonstration March 25 that saw hundreds arrested and, the opposition alleges, left at least one protestor dead.
