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The Foreign Secretary has today (Wednesday 6 April) announced a significant ratcheting up of UK sanctions on Russia.
Following further reports of abhorrent attacks on civilians in Ukraine this week, the Foreign Secretary has today (Wednesday 6 April) announced a significant ratcheting up of UK sanctions on Russia.
As a leading voice calling for international action, the UK’s fifth package of measures will cut off key sectors of the Russian economy and end our dependency on Russian energy. Today’s measures have been delivered in lockstep with our global allies as the EU has also banned imports of Russian coal and the US has sanctioned SberBank.
Announcing the package, the Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said:
Today, we are stepping up our campaign to bring Putin’s appalling war to an end with some of our toughest sanctions yet.
Our latest wave of measures will bring an end to the UK’s imports of Russian energy and sanction yet more individuals and businesses, decimating Putin’s war machine.
Together with our allies, we are showing the Russian elite that they cannot wash their hands of the atrocities committed on Putin’s orders. We will not rest until Ukraine prevails.
Key sanctions announced today include:
asset freezes against Sberbank and Credit Bank of Moscow. Sberbank is Russia’s largest bank and this freeze is being taken in co-ordination with the US
an outright ban on all new outward investment to Russia. In 2020 UK investment in Russia was worth over £11 billion. This will be another major hit to the Russian economy and further limit their future capabilities
by the end of 2022, the UK will end all dependency on Russian coal and oil, and end imports of gas as soon as possible thereafter. From next week, the export of key oil refining equipment and catalysts will also be banned, degrading Russia’s ability to produce and export oil – targeting not only the industry’s finances but its capabilities as a whole
action against key Russian strategic industries and state owned enterprises. This includes a ban on imports of iron and steel products, a key source of revenue. Russia’s military ambitions are also being thwarted by new restrictions on its ability to acquire the UK’s world-renowned quantum and advanced material technologies
and targeting a further eight oligarchs active in these industries, which Putin uses to prop up his war economy
They include:
At tomorrow’s meeting of G7 Foreign Ministers the Foreign Secretary will call for further collective action, including an accelerated timetable for all G7 countries to end their dependency on Russian energy.
She will also call for continued G7 unity in imposing further co-ordinated waves of sanctions against the Russian economy and elites around Putin, until Russia withdraws its troops and ends its brutal campaign of aggression against Ukraine once and for all.
View the full UK Sanctions List.
An asset freeze prevents anyone in the UK, or any UK national or registered company anywhere in the world, from dealing with any funds or economic resources which are owned, held or controlled by the designated person. It will also prevent funds or economic resources being provided to or for the benefit of the designated person.
A travel ban means that the designated person must be refused leave to enter or to remain in the United Kingdom, providing the individual to be an excluded person under section 8B of the Immigration Act 1971.
Recently introduced powers make it a criminal offence for any Russian aircraft to fly or land in the UK, and give the government powers to remove aircraft belonging to designated Russian individuals and entities from the UK aircraft register, even if the sanctioned individual is not on board. Russian ships are also banned from UK ports.
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