UK Continues Stream of Sanctions, Export Controls on Russia Following Ukraine Invasion
The United Kingdom maintained its barrage of restrictions imposed against Russia following its invasion of Ukraine. So far, the government has sweeping sanctions on a host of Russian individuals and entities, including the Russian Central Bank and President Vladimir Putin himself (see 2202280024). This deluge continued on Feb. 28 and March 1 with greater action to isolate Russia and freeze it out of the global economy.
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For starters, the Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation designated another three Russian banks, VEB.RF, Bank Otkritie Financial Corporation PJSC and PJSC Sovcombank. The three banks were subjected to an asset freeze, in a Feb. 28 notice. All three are all subject to U.S. sanctions as well, while VEB.RF is the only one of the three to be subject to EU sanctions.
OFSI further listed four Belarusian individuals and two entities under the U.K.'s Russian sanctions regime. The listed individuals are Andrei Burdyko, Belarusian deputy minister of defense for logistics; Victor Vladimirovich Gulevich, first deputy minister of defense; Sergei Simonenko, deputy minister of defense for armament; and Andrey Zhuk, deputy minister of defense. The two entities are the JSC 558 Aircraft Repair Plant and JSC Integral.
On the export control front, the Department for International Trade, in a Feb. 28 publication, suspended all existing export licenses for dual-use items to Russia, including licenses with Russia listed as a final destination, and suspended the approval of new export licenses for dual-use items. Russia was also removed as a permitted destination for many open general export licenses. The scope of the existing ban on the export, supply and delivery of military goods and technology to and for use in Russia was expanded to include critical-industry, dual-use and military goods adan technology.
The "critical-industry goods" include various electronics, computers, telecommunications equipment and aerospace items, among other things. The DIT further extended the ban on the provision of technical assistance and financial services to these other categories of goods.
Three new Russia-related General Licenses were also issued by OFSI. The first, "Transferable securities, money-market instruments, loans and credit arrangements," authorizes certain transactions with transferable security or money-market instruments otherwise banned until March 8. The second "Correspondent Banking Relationships & Processing Sterling Payments," permits certain sterling payments between U.K. financial institutions and Sberbank until March 31. The third, "Correspondent Banking Relationships & Processing Sterling Payments in relation to Energy," authorizes the processing of sterling payments between British financial institutions and Sberbank for making Relevant Energy Products available in the U.K. until June 24.