Britain hits Russia and Belarus with sanctions

The UK has imposed sanctions on Russia and Belarus that will affect trade worth £1.7 billion ($2.1bn).

Import tariffs and export bans on the countries have been drawn up by the International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan and Chancellor Rishi Sunak.

It is Britain’s third round of sanctions in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This time, oligarchs and generals are personal targets.

The Department for International Trade said import tariffs on £1.4bn worth of goods, including the precious metals platinum and palladium, would hamper Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “ability to fund his war effort”.

It said the move would bring the value of products subjected to full or partial import and export sanctions on Moscow and Minsk to more than £4 billion since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began.

Planned export bans “intend to hit more than £250 million worth of goods in sectors of the Russian economy most dependent on UK goods, targeting key materials such as chemicals, plastics, rubber and machinery”, the DIT said. Ms Trevelyan said: “We are determined to do our utmost to thwart Putin’s aims in Ukraine and undermine his illegal invasion, which has seen barbaric acts perpetrated against the Ukrainian people.

“This far-reaching package of sanctions will inflict further damage on the Russian war machine.”

Mr Sunak said the decision by Mr Putin to invade Ukraine was causing suffering on an enormous scale.

“His barbaric war must be stopped. Over £4 billion worth of goods will now be subject to import and export sanctions, doing significant damage to Putin’s war effort,” he said.

It is the third round of trade sanctions announced by the British government.

The DIT said that, excluding gold and energy, the measures would “bring the proportion of goods imports from Russia hit by restrictions to more than 96 per cent, with more than 60 per cent of goods exports to Russia under whole or partial restrictions”.

The department said about “£1.4 billion of imports would face an additional 35 percentage point tariff” and legislation would “be laid in due course” to enable these measures.