Podgorica government

Montenegrin government session in Podgorica. Photo: Government of Montenegro

The government adopted the measures on Friday, more than five weeks after it joined EU sanctions on Moscow on March 1.

Deputy Prime Minister Dritan Abazovic said the move covers a wide package of restrictions on Russian officials, banks, companies and media.

In their 2018 book, Power in Interpersonal Conflict, Joyce Hocker and William Wilmont argue that "power depends on controlling currencies that other people need".

An oil and gas exploration platform in the Black Sea. Photo: EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

A consortium of Italy's Eni and Russia's Novatek plans on March 25 to start exploratory oil and gas drilling offshore from Montenegro under a concession contract signed in 2016.

Serbia's Defence Minister Aleksandar Vulin attended a commemoration in Montenegro on Tuesday to mark the 20th anniversary of the murder of Yugoslav Defence Minister Pavle Bulatovic in 2000.

After US President Donald Trump signed the NATO accession protocol for Montenegro - removing one of the last remaining obstacles to membership of the alliance - NATO foes in Montenegro are looking to The Netherlands - one of two alliance members which still did not ratify the treaty, along with Spain - to block the process.

British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said events last October in Montenegro - where the government says it forestalled a Russian-organized coup - show the Kremlin is busy "undermining" governments in the Balkans and elsewhere.

The Podgorica government believes that a NATO membership invitation is inevitable at the two-day meeting that starts on Tuesday and has invited dozens of journalists from major Montenegrin media to Brussels to witness the occasion.