After Putin sent in Russian troops into two areas of Russia that the Russian President tried to explain away, saying they were ‘peacekeeping troops’, US President Joe Biden came down hard on the oligarch, calling it “the beginning of a Russian invasion” and announced sanctions.
“I’m announcing the first tranche of sanctions to impose costs on Russia in response to their actions yesterday,” Biden said. “These have been closely coordinated with our allies and partners and we’ll continue to escalate sanctions if Russia escalates.”
Here are the sanctions:
- “We’re implementing full blocking sanctions on two large Russian financial institutions: VEB and their military bank.”
- “We’re implementing comprehensive sanctions on Russia’s sovereign debt. That means we’ve cut off Russia’s government from Western financing. It can no longer raise money from the West and can not trade in its new debt on our markets or European markets either.”
- “We’ll also impose sanctions on Russia’s elites and their family members. They share in the corrupt gains of the Kremlin policies and should share in the pain as well.”
- “We’ve worked with Germany to ensure that Nord Stream 2 will not … move forward.”
Biden also announced that if Russia “continues its aggression,” additional sanctions could follow.