Western Governments Enforce Economic Sanctions Against Russia
The sanctions were announced in a statement from the UK, US, EU and Canada on Saturday night.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine last week, there have been various critiques of the UK’s attempts at retaliation through economic sanctions with Tom Keatinge, the founding Director of RUSI, likening the UK’s response to “turning up to a gunfight with a peashooter”. Now the UK has begun to implement more substantial joint sanctions with other Western governments.
Potentially the most promising point of action is the expulsion of a selection of Russian banks from Swift, the world’s largest financial messaging service and payment system. This will restrict Russia’s ability to access its oversees reserves as an important development following Putin’s accumulation of $500bn worth of reserves. This will also threaten Russia’s economy as it is deeply reliant on Swift for its oil and gas exports which hold a lot of political power over countries such as Italy and Germany who are dependent on these exports to support their citizens. Although a decision has not been reached regarding putting a stop to Russian gas and oil imports, President Biden has stated that payments for these energy sources will be unaffected.
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