U.S. and Allies Impose Sanctions on Russia as Biden Condemns ‘Invasion’ of Ukraine

Financial markets around the world wobbled on Tuesday in the wake of the Russian actions and the response from Western governments. In the United States, the news pushed stocks lower, leaving the SP 500 in correction territory, more than 10 percent below its January peak. Oil prices, which had risen to nearly $100 a barrel in anticipation of a global disruption, settled at $96.84 a barrel, up 1.5 percent.

Mr. Biden and his counterparts in Germany, England and other European nations described the package of global sanctions as severe. They include financial directives by the United States to deny Russia the ability to borrow money in Western markets and to block financial transactions by two banks and the families of three wealthy Russian elites.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany put the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline on hold. The $11 billion conduit from Russia to Germany — completed but not yet operational — is crucial to Moscow’s plans to increase energy sales to Europe. European Union foreign ministers and the British government approved sanctions against legislators in Moscow who voted to authorize the use of force, as well as Russian elites, companies and organizations.

“It will hurt a lot,” said the E.U. foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell Fontelles.

The governments of Japan, Taiwan and Singapore also issued a joint statement saying they would limit technology exports to Russia in an effort to pressure Mr. Putin with damaging restrictions on his ambitions to compete in high-tech industries.

But the moves in Washington and other capitals around the world were limited in scope and fell short of the more sweeping economic warfare that some — including members of Congress and other supporters of Ukraine — have repeatedly demanded in recent weeks.

Mr. Biden and his counterparts have said they must balance the need to take swift and severe action with preserving the possibility of even greater sanctions on Russia if Mr. Putin escalates the conflict by trying to seize more territory claimed by the separatists, or even the entire country — a war that could kill tens of thousands of people.

“This is the beginning of a Russian invasion of Ukraine,” he said, adding that “we’ll continue to escalate sanctions if Russia escalates.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/22/us/politics/us-russia-ukraine-sanctions.html