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 Several ministers had tears in their eyes when Timmermans said he
had known personally some of the 194 Dutch passengers among the 298
people who died on the plane, which Washington believes pro-Russian
separatists shot down in error.
"To my dying day I will not understand that it took so much time for
the rescue workers to be allowed to do their difficult job, and that
human remains should be used in a political game," Timmermans told
the U.N. Security Council hours earlier, before flying overnight to
Brussels for the crucial EU session.
Until that meeting on Tuesday, Europe had trailed the United States
in imposing economic sanctions to pressure Moscow into working to
defuse the eight-month crisis in Ukraine in which hundreds of people
have been killed.
Many governments were reluctant to antagonize a major energy
supplier. Concern over the cost to Europe's convalescent economy of
fraying the vast network of industrial and business links with
Russia also weighed heavily.
Intense lobbying by Washington, including a warning by President
Barack Obama that the plane downing should be "a wake up call for
Europe", had done little to change that mentality.
But like a supportive family, EU partners rallied around the
bereaved Dutch, putting national economic interests aside and for
the first time going beyond asset freezes and visa bans on
individuals to envisage curbs on entire sectors of the Russian
economy that could turn the screw on President Vladimir Putin.
 Gruesome images of bodies strewn across fields after the downing of
flight MH17 appear to have persuaded some of the opponents of
sanctions to take a more decisive, if painful, stand against Russian
detribalization of Ukraine.
Within days of Timmermans' address, senior EU diplomats had agreed
the broad outlines of potential sanctions on Russian access to EU
capital markets, defense and energy technology.
Final decisions await more deliberations next week - but diplomats
said on Friday an initial package was now virtually a done deal.
"It is fair to say we are heading in the direction," one EU diplomat
told Reuters.
In the run up to Friday's discussions, Dutch Prime Minister Mark
Rutte had a series of phone calls with his EU counterparts, near
daily calls with Obama and six conversations with Putin.
"We want, as a country that has acquired a certain moral obligation
as a result of this tragedy, to promote Europe taking a common line
on this," Rutte told parliament in The Hague.
The Dutch are a trading nation with outsized commercial ties to
Russia and are often reluctant to let politics get in the way of a
good deal. But an opinion poll this week found 78 percent back
economic sanctions even if it hurts their own economy.
LAST STRAW
Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, long an advocate of
harsher sanctions, said the plane crash was the "last straw that
broke the camel's back".
"The behavior of the separatists ... the scandalous plundering of
the luggage and the bodies themselves - all this made an enormous
impression on the Netherlands ... and on all of us," he told
reporters after Tuesday's meeting.
The EU turnaround became possible when key players shifted their
positions. Timmermans' impassioned speech, several diplomats said,
made it difficult for others to hold a firm line against sanctions
at Tuesday's meeting.
"The Dutch minister gave a very effective, emotional lead... saying
we have got to move on beyond just naming individuals. No one found
it possible to speak against that," one senior European diplomat
said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who felt personally misled by Putin
after months of intense dialogue, joined the drive for broader
measures against Moscow even before the plane crash. Berlin has by
far the biggest trade with Russia.
After the downing of the airliner, Britain too agreed to
restrictions on Russian access to capital markets largely based in
its City of London financial center which it had previously
resisted.
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German government sources said Berlin, which had been hesitant on
sanctions for months, demanded that senior EU diplomats meet as soon
as last Monday to work out a more effective sanctions package. To
their annoyance, a holiday at EU headquarters for Belgium's national
day got in the way.
EU leaders had agreed at a July 16 summit that more Russian people
and companies should be targeted with asset freezes by the end of
the month but that was suddenly not enough. "It is true that the
European Council had set a deadline of the end of the month, but
after the plane crash everybody should have understood the situation
was far more urgent", one Berlin source said. "We were losing time
when time was precious."
ITALY CHANGES TONE
Another notable change of tone came from Italy, which along with
Germany is the biggest consumer of Russian gas in Europe.
Foreign Minister Federica Mogherini, who had drawn criticism for
making her first visit in the EU's rotating president to Moscow at
the start of July, now said repeatedly she wanted to see additional
sanctions imposed on Russia.
"The Malaysian air disaster weighed heavily on everyone," an Italian
source said. "Timmermans spoke for half an hour. It was a very
emotional speech where he described the pain and anger of the Dutch.
An airplane with 300 people in it was shot down and that changed
everything."
Some diplomats suggested Mogherini's change of tone might have more
to do with her push to become the next EU foreign policy chief after
Catherine Ashton's mandate ends in October. Several central European
leaders expressed opposition to her at the summit because of her
emollience towards Russia.
Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite summed up their mood by
saying she would not back a "pro-Kremlin" candidate.
The final shape of the sanctions package may hinge on a tug of war
between Britain and France over who bears the brunt of economic pain
of such decisions.
Diplomats said the French dug their heels in after British Prime
Minister David Cameron publicly criticized Paris' decision to
deliver the first of two Mistral helicopter carriers it is building
for Moscow under a 2011 contract.
"The estimates are that in the current package the pain for the UK
would probably be greater than for anyone else," said one senior
diplomat, referring to the potential damage to London's City banks
if financial restrictions are imposed.
Recognizing the shift, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union,
Anthony Gardner, said his impression was the mood towards Russia had
changed this week.
"Our impression is that several countries now believe that the
choice that they thought was on the table of taking the bitter
medicine today and not taking the bitter medicine tomorrow was a
false choice," he told reporters.
"That choice never existed. Now the choice is either taking the
bitter medicine today or taking an even more bitter medicine
tomorrow."
(Additional reporting by Paul Taylor in Paris, Adrian Croft, Jan
Strupczewski and Martin Santa in Brussels, Thomas Escritt in
Amsterdam, Andreas Rinke in Berlin and Steven Scherer in Rome;
Editing by Paul Taylor)
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