Trump administration to impose fresh sanctions against Russia
The United States is expected to impose additional sanctions against Russia by Friday, U.S. officials told The Washington Post.
The sanctions are economic and designed to target oligarchs with ties to President Vladimir Putin, the officials said. The final number of Russians facing punitive action remains fluid, the U.S. officials said, but is expected to include at least a half-dozen people.
In recent weeks, Trump’s national security advisers have pushed for more sanctions in the wake of the poisoning of a former Russian spy in England, interference in the U.S. 2016 elections and a cyberattack described as the most destructive and costly in history.
Officials spoke about the sanctions on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss pending actions.
On Tuesday night, outgoing national security adviser H.R. McMaster called on the United States to take a tougher line against Moscow, saying, “We have failed to impose sufficient costs.”
The remark came hours after President Trump said in a White House news conference that “nobody has been tougher on Russia than I have.”
Russian officials, meanwhile, have expressed exasperation with the United States. Moscow’s ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov, said the “atmosphere in Washington is poison.”
“It’s a toxic atmosphere,” he told NBC News.
Last week, the United States expelled 60 Russian spies and diplomats in response to the poisoning of Sergei Skripal, the former Russian spy, and his daughter, the largest expulsion of Russians in U.S. history.
In early March, the administration also slapped fresh sanctions on Russian government hackers and spy agencies for interfering in the 2016 election and the cyberattack.