US imposes sanctions on 7 Russian officials, 17 firms
The United States on Monday imposed new sanctions on seven
Russian officials and 17 firms linked to President Vladimir Putin's inner
circle to punish the Kremlin for failing to ease tensions in Ukraine.
Deepening the worst East-West showdown since the end of the
Cold War, Washington is also tightening licensing requirements for certain
hi-tech exports to Russia that could have a military use, the White House
announced in a statement issued in Manila, where President Barack Obama is on a
state visit.
"The United States has taken further action today in
response to Russia's continued illegal intervention in Ukraine and provocative
acts that undermine Ukraine's democracy and threaten its peace, security, stability,
sovereignty, and territorial integrity," said White House spokesman Jay
Carney in a statement.
Carney said Russia had done nothing to meet the terms of a
deal agreed in Geneva with Ukraine, the European Union and the United States
and designed to rein in pro-Moscow separatists in eastern Ukraine.
"Russia's involvement in the recent violence in eastern
Ukraine is indisputable," he said.
The sanctions follow up on previously announced measures
targeting other members of Putin's political and inner circle and a Russian
bank.
The measures are designed to build economic and political
pressure on Putin, and to try to force a change of tactics in Ukraine.
They do not however specifically target sectors of the
Russian economy like energy and mining.
The White House said those measures would only be imposed by
the United States and its European allies if Russia actually invades Ukraine.
A senior US official said the sanctions would be rolled out
in coordination with new European Union sanctions, and that existing measures
were already having a "substantial impact" on the Russian economy.
Diplomatic sources in Brussels said that a further 15
officials would be subject to the same visa bans and asset freezes already
imposed on 50 others.
The sources said the action would be taken because Moscow
shows no sign of reversing course in Ukraine.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told the
Interfax news agency that his country would respond to the sanctions.
"We are certain that this response will have a painful
effect on Washington," he said.
US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said Russia's
"dangerous and inflammatory actions against Ukraine are illegal and
illegitimate".
He said in a statement that Russia's economic growth
forecasts had "dropped sharply, capital flight has accelerated and higher
borrowing costs reflect declining confidence in the market outlook".
The companies sanctioned include Avia Group limited, the Severny
Morsoy Bank, InvestCapital Bank, Transoil, Volga Resources Group, SMP Bank,
Sobin Bank and Zest Leasing.
Prominent individuals sanctioned by Washington include Igor
Sechin, who is considered one of Putin's most conservative lieutenants and his
right hand man on energy issues and currently heads state oil company Rosneft.
Sechin is widely rumoured to have been a KGB resident spy in
the 1980s. He almost never gives interviews but his former friends and
colleagues have said that he worked as a translator and then served in the
Soviet army in Africa.
The measures also hit Sergei Chemezov, CEO of Russian
Technologies (Rostec) corporation, created in 2007 to consolidate management of
Russian industry and which now controls or has stakes in hundreds of companies.
Chemezov has reportedly known Putin since the 1980s, when
the two met in East Germany.
Another official in Putin's inner circle on the list is
Vyacheslav Volodin, currently the first deputy chief of staff in the Kremlin.
He was instrumental in Putin's campaign for a third presidential term.
Alexei Pushkov, another key official hit by the new
sanctions, heads the international affairs committee in the Russian Duma lower
house of parliament, representing the pro-Kremlin United Russia party.
Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak is also on the list. He
was Putin's pointman on the Sochi Winter Olympic Games and now heads the
efforts by Russia to invigorate the economy of the Crimean peninsula.
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