It’s a far different trajectory than he imagined when his administration began last year with the goals of countering China’s growing influence in the world and reinvesting at home as the United States tried to turn the page on a deadly pandemic.
The sanctions include freezing the assets of all major Russian banks, including VTB Bank, the nation’s second-biggest bank, Johnson said Thursday. Britain also plans to bar Russian companies and the Russian government from raising money on U.K. markets.
In unleashing Moscow’s most aggressive action since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, President Vladimir Putin deflected global condemnation and cascading new sanctions — and chillingly referred to his country’s nuclear arsenal. He threatened any foreign country attempting to interfere with “consequences you have never seen.”
Market benchmarks in Europe and Asia fell as much as 5 per cent as traders tried to figure out how large Putin's incursion would be and the scale of Western retaliation.
Students are not able to exchange their currency as Ukrainian stores have stopped trading dollars. The Indian mission in Kyiv was planning to relocate Indian nationals to the western border and has advised them to keep their passport and necessary documents with them all the time.
Western sanctions and disruption of payments in dollars, as well as transhipments to Russia, are expected as a fall-out of Russia launching an attack on Ukraine.
Several researchers sharing Russia-Ukraine information found their Twitter accounts unexpectedly suspended today.
The Ukrainian military, meanwhile, reported that it has shot down five Russian aircraft while fending off the Russian attack on the country.
However, it is not clear whether Zhang Jun, China's permanent representative to UN, made the statement after Russian Prez Vladimir Putin on Feb 24 announced a military operation in Ukraine, claiming it's intended to protect civilians.
Guterres addressed an emergency UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine late Wednesday night, the second meeting this week and the fourth since January 31 as tensions escalated between Russia and Ukraine. Earlier in the day, the UN chief had addressed the UN General Assembly meeting on Ukraine.
Biden says he plans to speak to the American people Thursday after a meeting of the Group of Seven leaders. More sanctions against Russia are expected to be announced Thursday.
"The UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine is scheduled today for 21:30 New York time and will be held in the format of an open briefing," the mission said.
Russia began pulling personnel from its diplomatic posts in Ukraine, state news agency Tass reported, a day after the Foreign Ministry announced a plan to evacuate, citing threats.
Ordinary Ukrainian civilians take part in military drills to prepare for possible war, handling automatic rifles or advancing in formation as the country lives under the threat of a feared Russian invasion. Families hold tearful goodbyes in separatist-held eastern Ukraine, as women and children wave from trains and buses bound for Russia.
Ukrainian Foreign Min Dmytro Kuleba, who jointly addressed a news conference with Blinken at the Foggy Bottom headquarters of State Dept, said that the world must respond with all its economic might to punish Russia for the crimes it has already committed and ahead of the crimes it plans to commit.
Antonio Guterres said Russia’s unilateral actions also “conflict” with the UN Charter and are “a death blow to the Minsk Agreements” aimed at restoring peace to eastern Ukraine.
The Biden administration says its toughest sanctions package, already worked out in consultation with European allies, would be enough to hit Putin and Russia's elites, cripple Russia's ability to do business internationally, and likely bring on a recession there.
The European Union also put some of its cards on the table, saying its sanctions would take aim at several Russian officials, banks financing the Russian armed forces and include limiting Moscow’s access to EU capital and financial markets.
The sanctions target Rossiya, IS Bank, General Bank, Promsvyazbank and the Black Sea Bank, as well as billionaires Gennady Timchenko, Boris Rotenberg and Igor Rotenberg as three 'very high net worth individuals'.
The U.S. called Putin's moves a pretext for a further invasion, many members condemned his violation of Ukraine's territorial integrity, and even close ally China urged diplomacy and a peaceful solution.
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