US readies ‘major’ new Russia sanctions
Biden vows to hold Putin accountable for war in Ukraine, opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s death in prison.
The United States is preparing to levy more economic sanctions on Russia in response to the death in prison of Alexei Navalny and marking the second anniversary of the war in Ukraine.
“What I came to tell you was -- I told you we’d be announcing sanctions on Russia -- we’ll have a major package announced on Friday,” President Biden said at the White House on February 20.
The sanctions will “hold Russia accountable for what happened to Mr. Navalny, and quite frankly, for all its actions over the course of this vicious and brutal war that has now raged on for two years,” White House spokesman John Kirby told reporters.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began two years ago on February 25. The US and allies have imposed repeated rounds of ever tougher economic sanctions against Russia since 2014 when Moscow annexed Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine. While these measures have imposed costs on Russia, they have failed to deter Putin from waging war.
National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the forthcoming sanctions would cover “a range of different elements of the Russian defense industrial base and sources of revenue for the Russian economy that power Russia’s war machine.”
The US Congress, meanwhile, is advancing legislation, supported by the White House, that would give the US government legal authority to confiscate approximately $60 billion in Russian central bank assets held in US financial institutions. The assets would be used to help rebuild Ukraine.
Biden has blamed Putin for Navalny’s death. “Putin is responsible, whether he ordered it or he is responsible for the circumstances he put that man in,” Biden told reporters in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, on February 17 after news of Navalny’s death.
European Union officials have demanded an independent investigation into Navalny’s death and vowed to take steps to hold Putin accountable. Navalny, aged 47, had been transferred late last year to the ‘Polar Wolf’ Gulag north of the Arctic Circle in Kharp.
A popular figure in Russia, Navalny had been imprisoned after returning to Russia in 2021 following his recovery from an earlier attempt on his life by poisoning. Reports suggested Navalny died suddenly after taking a walk. His body was reportedly transferred to a local morgue. Navalny’s mother traveled to Kharp seeking to claim his remains.
Are sanctions on China next?
Speaking to a reporter at the Munich Security Conference over the weekend, US Representative Gerry Conolly said the Congress is considering sanctions on Chinese firms that are helping Russia’s war effort.
“China has to understand that the same kinds of sanctions which are beginning to really take hold in Russia and are affecting Russian productivity, economic performance and quality of life, can also be applied to China,” Connolly told CNBC’s Silvia Amaro. “And frankly, China has a lot more to lose than Russia.”
“My hope is the very threat of it — and the fact that the Europeans are really serious about this, which is a relatively recent development — ought to clarify some thinking in Beijing, I hope,” Connolly said.
“If broad sanctions were applied to China, it would really hit home. And their economic performance right now is already weak. So, I would hope China would calculate carefully that there are consequences around the corner for supporting Russia’s violence and depravity in Ukraine.”
Blinken, Wang meet in Munich
Speaking to the Munich conference, China Foreign Affairs Minister Wang Yi warned the West that it would be making a historical mistake if it sought to decouple from China in the interests of reducing risk, according to Reuters.
"Whoever tries de-Sinicization in the name of de-risking would be making a historical mistake," Wang said in a speech on February 17 at the conference in which he disavowed China’s responsibility for the war in Ukraine and sought to emphasize Beijing’s peace initiative with Moscow and Kyiv.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Wang met on the sidelines of the Munich conference.
“The two sides had substantive discussions on a range of regional and global issues. The Secretary raised concerns over the PRC’s support for Russia’s war against Ukraine, including support to the Russian defense industrial base,” the State Department said in a readout.
— William Roberts