Russia will use these virtual currencies to circumvent international economic sanctions.
The European Union does not intend to leave Russia any leeway. Bruno Le Mer announced on Wednesday that European sanctions against Moscow will soon include measures on cryptocurrencies. “We will take action on cryptocurrencies that should not be used to circumvent financial sanctions imposed by the European Union“Said the French Minister of Economy, whose country is chairing the Union’s rotating presidency, during a press briefing.
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Companies and banks are already using these virtual currencies to circumvent international sanctions. Which leads to a boom in the market, especially bitcoin. This practice risks weakening the effectiveness of European sanctions and threatens to make unproductive the exclusion of seven Russian banks from Wednesday’s Swift interbank system.
The exclusion of Swift is aimed at VTB, the second largest bank in Russia, as well as Otkrytie Bank, Novikombank (industry financing), Promsvyazbank, Bank of Russia, Sovcombank and VEB (regime development bank). The EU is refraining from including institutions that process energy payments. The respective banks have ten days to terminate their Swift operations.
G7 on the same line
According to Bruno le Mer, “there was a broad consensus among Member States that we could not allow cryptocurrencies to circumvent the effectiveness of financial sanctions against Russia“He said at the end of the video conference of the Ministers of Economy and Finance of the Twenty-seven. No details were given about the specific means studied.
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The G7 pursues the same reflection. “We must also take steps to prevent these individuals and institutions from turning to unregulated cryptocurrencies. We also worked in this direction within the German G-7 presidency.This was stated by German Finance Minister Christian Lindner in a statement issued on Wednesday.