Ukrainian President calls for expanding sanctions against Russia following U.S. decision
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has called the expansion of individual sanctions by the U.S. authorities “unprecedented.” He praised the recent sanctions imposed against persons designated under the January 2018 Kremlin Report as “a decent answer to the aggressor.”
Poroshenko welcomed the decision of the U.S., stating that the free world will continue strengthening a coalition against Russian aggression. This unified effort, he stated, is based on “strong Transatlantic unity and common values.”
The Ukrainian President expressed confidence that the European Union would soon tighten up sanctions against the Kremlin elite, calling on Ukrainian authorities to prepare similar measures.
“I expect the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine to quickly prepare suggestions for synchronizing the Ukrainian and American strengthening of sanctions,” he stated on Twitter. “Only by acting in a cohesive way, as a united front, can we change the behavior of Russia and restore the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.”
Just days before, on April 6, the U.S. Department of Treasury announced its decision to designate seven Russian businessmen and 17 top officials under a sanction list of individuals and companies whose assets must be frozen.
“The Russian government engages in a range of malign activity around the globe, including continuing to occupy Crimea and instigate violence in eastern Ukraine, supplying the Assad regime with material and weaponry as they bomb their own civilians, attempting to subvert Western democracies, and malicious cyber activities,” said U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin. “Russian oligarchs and elites who profit from this corrupt system will no longer be insulated from the consequences of their government’s destabilizing activities.”