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The world – the Americas
Unlike the previous US administration, which preferred not to use the weapon of sanctions against Russia, especially in the Navalny file, the new administration opened its era with Moscow by imposing sanctions on several Russian officials whose names were not announced until last night, explaining: by senior officials, that these measures represent a reflection of those imposed by the European Union.
US officials added that “close coordination will be carried out with European allies in the subsequent handling of this file,” attributing the sanctions to the need to “hold Russia responsible for the attack on Navalny and his arrest.” They emphasized that the Biden administration “is taking a different approach to Russia” than it prevailed during the Donald Trump administration.
One official stated that “Washington intelligence services concluded with great confidence that Russian Federal Security Forces officers used a nerve poisonous substance known as Benovichok” to poison Navalny last August, while others announced the imposition of sanctions on “seven senior members of the Russian Federation government”. They added that Washington “will limit exports to Moscow.”
Right now, the European Union has expanded the sanctions it approved last month against Russia, in coordinated action with the United States. Yesterday, he announced the imposition of new sanctions on Russian government officials, who are: the prosecutor, the head of the Central Investigation Committee, the head of the enforcement authority, as well as the commander of the National Guard. This package comes on the heels of another, which included the imposition of a travel ban and an assets freeze in Europe, which the bloc approved yesterday against four high-level Russian officials.
In this regard, Moscow was not surprised by Western measures against it, stating, through the words of its Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, that it would “necessarily respond” to these sanctions. “No one has canceled the rules of diplomacy, and one of these rules is the principle of reciprocity,” said the Russian minister, who described the sanctions as “useless.” As for the Kremlin, he anticipated the Western statement by saying that “any further sanction from the United States will not achieve its goal and will only lead to further disturbances in already strained relations.” His spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, added: “Those who continue to rely on these measures will probably give it some thought: Are they achieving any goal by pursuing such a policy? … The answer is clear: such a policy will not achieve its goals.”
Moscow seems aware these days of the changes that occurred in its relations with the United States after Biden’s arrival in the White House. President Vladimir Putin finally spoke about the American-European approach to his country, saying that “With Biden coming to power in the United States, the West began to behave as a united and agglomerated West.” This is what the president of the United States himself repeatedly referred to during his election campaign, stressing that one of the most important goals of his administration is to isolate and contain Russia. In fact, the first weeks of his mandate showed a change in US policy towards Russia, through successive criticism of the behavior of his counterpart, Putin, whom he described as “hostile” and the reactivation of the “policy of containment. “as well as strengthening. relations with the countries of Eastern Europe to improve the influence of the US on the borders with Russia.
