Sweeping new measures target companies in China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates in an attempt to disrupt Russia’s supply chain.
The United States has announced new sanctions against around 130 new companies, including firms in China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, that are alleged to be supplying the Russian military with badly needed components and technology and abetting the ongoing war in Ukraine.
“Russia relies on willing individuals and organizations from third countries to expand its military and continue its heinous war against Ukraine, and we will not hesitate to hold them accountable,” Treasury Secretary Jane Yellen said in a statement on Thursday.
The new measures target critical supply chains that would otherwise have allowed Russia to circumvent international sanctions and export controls by exploiting “otherwise legitimate economic relationships” with China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.
These loopholes allow companies in the three countries to ship “priority dual-use items” such as vehicle parts or encryption software to Russia that can be used by civilians or military personnel.
The latest sanctions hail Ukraine and mark the first time Washington has taken action against the production of Russia’s Lancet suicide drones.
Ukrainian soldiers say the drone – a square gray tube with two sets of four wings – has emerged as a growing threat on the front lines.
In his evening video address, President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed the measures as “exactly what is needed”.
His chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, agreed.
“I am very pleased that … restrictions are being tightened against companies linked to the military-industrial complex of the Russian Federation …,” Yermak wrote on the messaging app Telegram.
The Treasury Department’s new sanctions also target Russia’s domestic industrial base, which the Treasury said has been refocused from “producing goods for the Russian people to trying to ensure that the war machine can sustain itself.”
Separately, the US State Department on Thursday imposed 100 new sanctions targeting Russia’s energy, metals and mining sectors, defense procurement and “those involved in supporting the Russian government’s war effort and other malign activities.”
The Commerce Department, meanwhile, also blacklisted 12 Russian companies and another from Uzbekistan that it said helped Moscow acquire key drone technology.
The United States, the European Union and other countries have already imposed sanctions on hundreds of Russian individuals and organizations since Moscow’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Further sanctions also targeted the country’s economy by freezing assets abroad, restricting exports and otherwise making the cost of doing business in Russia extremely demanding and expensive.
Yellen said the “global sanctions coalition” had “denied Russia access to key raw materials for its military-industrial complex and undermined the Kremlin’s ability to wage its unprovoked war.”
Despite the sanctions, Russia’s economy is expected to grow 1.5 percent this year, according to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, as countries such as China, Turkey and India provided Moscow with an important economic lifeline.