The US has barred American investments in Russia, placed sanctions on Vladimir Putin’s family members and other top Russian officials, and increased limits on Sberbank, the country’s largest financial institution, in a fresh round of measures.
The new penalties were announced on Wednesday, as the US and its Western allies accuse Russia of war crimes in Ukraine following the uncovering of atrocities in Russian-occupied territories near Kyiv. According to the White House, the steps were taken in collaboration with other G7 countries and the European Union.
On Wednesday, a senior Biden administration official told reporters that Russia is “descending into economic, financial, and technological isolation,” which is causing the country’s living standards to return to “Soviet-style” levels.
Putin’s two adult daughters, as well as Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s wife and daughter, were all fined.
President Joe Biden reaffirmed his claim that Putin is a “war criminal” on Monday, citing atrocities in Bucha, Ukraine, where corpses were recovered on the streets after Russian soldiers withdrew.
Following the announcement of the new penalties on Wednesday, Biden stated that the restrictions are harming the Russian economy and pledged to keep working to further isolate Moscow.
The White House cited alleged violations against Russian personnel, especially in Bucha, while announcing the latest penalties on Wednesday. Moscow has denied the abuses, implying that the footage and evidence of the abuses were faked.
The US Treasury banned Russia from utilizing frozen assets in the US to settle its debts earlier this week.
“Even if Russia uses alternative sources of hard currency to stay current on its debt obligations, that will leave Putin with fewer resources to support his war machine,” a US official said on Wednesday.
After a months-long standoff in which Moscow amassed almost 200,000 troops near the Ukrainian border, demanding a halt to NATO expansion into former Soviet republics, Russia began an all-out invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
The United States and its allies moved quickly to impose broad economic sanctions on Russia, as well as financial penalties on Putin and his inner circle.
The US Department of Justice announced two accusations of violating sanctions against Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeyev earlier on Wednesday, the first indictment since the invasion in February.
If convicted, Malofeyev faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison on each sanction charge, but he is still at large, according to the Department of Justice, and is believed to be in Russia.
On Wednesday, Attorney General Merrick Garland announced that the US had broken a dangerous digital network known as a botnet that was controlled by Russia’s military intelligence agency (GRU).
“Recently, the Russian government has employed similar equipment to attack targets in Ukraine.” Thankfully, we were able to stop this botnet from being used,” he stated. “We were able to detect the infection of thousands of network hardware devices because to our tight collaboration with foreign partners.” Before the botnet could be weaponized, we were able to terminate the GRU’s control over those devices.”
Last month, the White House ordered private enterprises in the United States to beef up their digital security in preparation for a possible Russian cyberattack on the country’s critical infrastructure.
“It makes no difference how far your yacht sails. It makes no difference how skillfully you hide your assets. The Justice Department will use every available tool to discover you, no matter how brilliantly you build your malware or mask your internet behavior,” Garland wrote in a message to Russian billionaires and “criminals” on Wednesday.
Garland also stated that the Justice Department will assist in the investigation of any war crimes in Ukraine. “Today, we are aiding international efforts to identify and punish those guilty for the atrocities in Ukraine accountable. “And we’ll keep doing it,” he said.
Source: Al Jazeera
