Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said he will tell Russia’s Vladimir Putin to ‘step back from the brink’ amid growing concerns of Moscow planning to invade Ukraine.
Pressure is mounting on Russia as the UK threatened to impose penalties on businesses and people with close links to the Kremlin and the US warned Moscow could face “the mother of all sanctions” over Ukraine.
Boris Johnson is due to speak to Russian President Vladimir Putin over the telephone later on Monday or on Tuesday, as he said he would tell Moscow to “step back from the brink”.
Simon Clarke, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, said on Monday morning that the UK is looking at tightening sanctions against Russia in an effort to warn off the threat of an attack on Ukraine.
“We are very clear that if Russia takes further action against the Ukraine, then we will further tighten the sanctions regime targeting those businesses and people with the closest links to the Kremlin,” he told Sky News.
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said she will introduce new legislation to broaden the scope of sanctions the Government can apply to Russia, saying it will ensure “there will be nowhere to hide for Putin’s oligarchs”. She and Mr Johnson will travel to Ukraine on Tuesday.
Defence Minister Ben Wallace said on Monday from Budapest that it was important to de-escalate the Ukraine-Russia crisis as a war would lead to greater instability, higher fuel prices and migrant flows.
Mr Wallace expressed support for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s planned trip to Russia on Tuesday for talks with Mr Putin, adding “we need to de-escalate this and stand up for the right for sovereignty of Ukraine”.
US President Joe Biden reiterated on Monday that Russia would face “swift and severe consequences” if it attacked its former Soviet neighbour, but he also kept the path of diplomacy open by suggesting the possibility of dialogue.
“If Russia is sincere about addressing our respective security concerns through dialogue, the United States and our Allies and partners will continue to engage in good faith”, Biden said in a statement Monday released by the White House.
“If instead Russia chooses to walk away from diplomacy and attack Ukraine, Russia will bear the responsibility, and it will face swift and severe consequences”.
It followed a senior US official saying the US and its allies have prepared a list of Russian elites in or near Mr Putin’s inner circle to hit with economic sanctions if Russia should invade Ukraine – which it denies planning to do.
“The individuals we have identified are in or near the inner circles of the Kremlin and play a role in government decision making or are at a minimum complicit in the Kremlin’s destabilising behaviour,” the official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The US has developed specific sanctions packages for both Russian elites who meet the criteria and their family members, and these efforts are being pursued in coordination with US allies and partners, the official said.
If Russian officials are serious when they say they don’t want a new war, Russia must continue diplomatic engagement and pull back military forces it amassed along Ukraine’s borders and in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. Diplomacy is the only responsible way.
— Dmytro Kuleba (@DmytroKuleba) January 30, 2022
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov promised “retaliatory measures” if Russian companies are targeted, saying the statement from London was “very worrying” and “demonstrates a fair amount of unpredictability on the part of London and is a cause for serious concern for international financial structures”.
“Essentially, the British cabinet is threatening its big businesses, among other things. The Anglo-Saxons are massively ramping up tensions on the European continent,” Mr Peskov said, calling it an “undisguised attack on business”.
On Sunday, the chairman of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Bob Menendez, said that in the event of an attack, politicians want Russia to face “the mother of all sanctions”, including actions against Russian banks that could severely undermine the country’s economy.
The sanctions under consideration would apparently be significantly stronger than those imposed after Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014.
Mr Menendez suggested some sanctions could be imposed before any invasion, telling CNN: “There are some sanctions that really could take place up front, because of what Russia’s already done – cyberattacks on Ukraine, false-flag operations, the efforts to undermine the Ukrainian government internally.”
The warnings come as the UN Security Council meets on Monday, with the American ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield saying it will pressure Russia to discuss its massing of about 100,000 troops near Ukraine.
“Our voices are unified in calling for the Russians to explain themselves,” she said. “We’re going into the room prepared to listen to them, but we’re not going to be distracted by their propaganda.”
But Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Dmitry Polyansky has already slammed the idea of talks and called the meeting a “clear PR stunt”.
Moscow has denied it is planning to invade Ukraine, with head of Russia’s Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, saying the claims were “completely ridiculous”.
“We don’t want war and we don’t need it at all,” he was quoted as saying by Russia’s TASS news agency.
Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, responded on Twitter: “If Russian officials are serious when they say they don’t want a new war, Russia must continue diplomatic engagement and pull back military forces.”
Russia has demanded Nato should not allow Ukraine to join the alliance and to stop the deployment of weapons near Russian borders. Both Nato and the US have rejected those demands but outlined areas where discussions are possible.
As a result of growing tensions in the region, Canada will temporarily withdraw non-essential embassy staff and their families in Ukraine, the foreign ministry said on Sunday.
“As we continue to closely monitor the situation, our highest priority remains the safety and security of Canadians,” the ministry said, adding that the embassy in Kyiv remains open.
Ukraine has stressed the need to stay calm over tensions near the border with Russia, with the country’s president Volodymyr Zelensky saying on Friday that the decision by the west to withdraw some of their diplomats from Kyiv as a “mistake”.
“The captains should not leave the ship. I don’t think we have a Titanic here,” he said.
Ukrainian Ambassador to the US, Oksana Markarova, rejected claims that Ukraine was downplaying the risk, telling CBS News: “We also know what Russia is capable of because they have attacked us already.”
She added: “Putin attacked us is not because he wants Ukraine, or only Ukraine. The reason he attacked us is because we have chosen to be a democracy and we have the Euro-Atlantic and European aspirations.
“So it’s an attack on democracy, and I believe nobody is safe if Ukraine will be attacked.”
https://inews.co.uk/news/world/russia-ukraine-conflict-uk-kremlin-us-sanctions-latest-news-1432391
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