Sunday Times 2
New sanctions to target prominent Russians as Kiev warns of ‘world war’
View(s):ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE/ SLAVYANSK, April 26 (AFP) – The next round of sanctions on Russia over the Ukraine crisis could target prominent Russians in the energy and banking industries and could come early next week, a senior White House official said today.
US Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes, speaking on Saturday to reporters aboard Air Force One en route to Malaysia with President Barack Obama, said sanctions could target “individuals with influence on the Russian economy, such as energy and banking.”
Ukrainians and Poles protest in front of the Russian Embassy in Warsaw (AFP)
“When you start to get at the cronies, the individuals who frankly control large parts of the Russia economy, and some of the entities under their control, you are imposing a significant economic impact beyond strictly sanctioning an individual,” he said.
He did not give a date when the sanctions would be imposed, but said it would not happen over the weekend.
“I would expect … targeted sanctions would be imposed with urgency” and could come “early next week.”
Earlier a US official told AFP that the new round of US sanctions could come as early as Monday.
Rhodes spoke after the Group of Seven rich countries — Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States — agreed today to impose new sanctions on Russia over the crisis in Ukraine.
The G7 nations, in a joint statement, gave no date but said they would “move swiftly to impose additional sanctions on Russia.”
Rhodes spoke of “a spectrum of sanctions” that “allows us to escalate further” if the situation in the ex-Soviet republic deteriorates further.
Obama on Friday said that new sanctions against Russia were “ready to go” but signalled they would not target key areas of the Russian economy such as mining, energy and the financial sectors.
US officials have said those measures would only be considered if Russia sent its regular forces across the border into eastern Ukraine.
“We understand there is unease about the economic consequences of sanctions on a large economy like Russia … There is a degree of unease in the private sector,” Rhodes said.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian authorities ratcheted up military operations against pro-Russian rebels in the east and their Cold War-style rhetoric.
‘The world hasn’t forgotten’
The world hasn’t forgotten the Second World War and Russia wants to start a third world war,” Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said.
“Russia’s support for the terrorists in Ukraine constitutes an international crime and we call on the international community to unite against the Russian aggression.”
A Western diplomat voiced concern of a possible Russian move into eastern Ukraine in the coming days, maybe even over the weekend.
“We no longer exclude a Russian military intervention in Ukraine in the coming days,” the diplomatic source said, noting that Russia’s UN envoy Vitaly Churkin “has been recalled urgently to Moscow” for consultations.
Tensions were further heightened on the ground as the Ukrainian military launched a new offensive to besiege the rebel-held city of Slavyansk and insurgents blew up an army helicopter with a rocket-propelled grenade.
At the entrance to Slavyansk, several members of an OSCE observer mission were detained and taken to the resbel-held security services building, sparking immediate international condemnation.
| Ukraine rebels accuse detained OSCE team of being ‘NATO spies’ sSLAVYANSK, Ukraine, April 26 (AFP) – Pro-Russian rebels holding a group of international OSCE observers in eastern Ukraine today accused them of being “NATO spies” and vowed to continue detaining them. “Yesterday, we arrested some NATO spies… they will be exchanged for our own prisoners. I don’t see any other way they will be freed,” Denis Pushilin, the head of the insurgents’ self-declared Donetsk Republic, told reporters. Pushilin was speaking in front of the SBU security services building in rebel-held Slavyansk, where the OSCE team was being held. Late Friday, German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen confirmed that pro-Russian separatists had arrested 13 mission members, including the observers, their interpreter and driver. Four of the team are Germans, including three members of the German military. The interior ministry in Kiev said that the OSCE observers were stopped at a rebel-held checkpoint as they were entering Slavyansk on Friday and were taken to the SBU building. The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe told AFP in Vienna, where it is based, that all the observers in its main mission on the ground in Ukraine were accounted for. |