Three Belarusian banks will also be disconnected from the international financial platform Swift.
Twenty-seven decided on Wednesday to expand their sanctions against Moscow and Minsk after the invasion of Ukraine, in particular by disconnecting three Belarusian banks from the international financial platform Swift, the French presidency of the EU Council said.
At the meeting in Brussels, member state representatives also added Russian leaders and oligarchs to their blacklist and adopted new sanctions targeting the “marine sector,” the same Twitter source added.
The Europeans expanded the list of technologies and goods that cannot be exported to Russia, and “clarified” the restrictions imposed on cryptocurrencies.
The G7 countries and the EU announced last week that they are aiming to stop Russia from finding loopholes in Western sanctions with the help of cryptocurrencies.
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Diversified Sanctions Regime
Since the United States and its Western allies imposed a series of sanctions aimed at hurting the banking sector and the Russian currency following the invasion of Ukraine, ruble-denominated cryptocurrency purchases have soared to an all-time high.
The measures taken on Wednesday by the Twenty-family, which will come into force after the official consent of the states and publication in the Official Journal of the EU, are intended to “complement” the three sets of sanctions adopted by the EU since the past. two weeks, stressed France, which presides over the EU Council.
Some of them, such as exclusion of Belarusian banks from Swift, a secure messaging platform that allows transactions such as the transit of payment orders and funds transfer orders between banks, are intended, in part, to prevent Russia from circumventing the same measure, which affects several of its banks.
Read alsoExclusion of Russia from the banking network Swift: “What are the consequences for Europe?”
Since the annexation of Crimea in 2014, the EU has already imposed sanctions on 680 people and 53 organizations that are banned from entering its territory and whose assets in Europe are frozen.
Since late February, Twenty-Seven has also paralyzed the assets of the Central Bank of Russia located outside of Russia, blocked the access of Russian financial institutions to European capital markets and disconnected seven Russian banks from the international financial system Swift.
Europe has also closed its airspace to Russian companies and banned the export of parts and technologies for the aviation industry to Russia.
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