In the U.S. Senate, Republicans and Democrats are practically agreed as to resist the initiative of the American President Donald trump on easing sanctions against Russia.
Senator Lindsey Graham told Politico that they are also close to approving a new tightening sanctions on Russia. Senators intend to block the President’s attempts to toughen sanctions, said the Senator from South Carolina Lindsey Graham. In an interview with CBS Graham said that the law, which will be a response to expected Russian intervention in elections in the United States, should be adopted as soon as next week.
The head of the foreign intelligence Service of the Russian Federation Sergey Naryshkin, citing sources, said that America plans to strengthen sanctions pressure on Moscow, stressing that the priority States, the economic war against Russia. Корреспондент.net understood, what Russia is prepared in Washington.
Not because of Ukraine
Reasons for the tightening of anti-Russian sanctions, in addition to intervention in the US presidential election, called the supply of weapons to Taliban “to kill American soldiers” in Afghanistan and “collusion” with Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad that has allowed him “to keep chemical weapons.”
The first sanctions against Russia, the United States imposed in March 2014 after the annexation of Crimea. Later America introduced sectoral sanctions, leaving Russian banks with no “long money” and the oil and arms — without technology.
Following the U.S. and European Union sanctions against Russia entered Canada, Japan, Switzerland, Australia and some other countries. Moscow responded with a ban on food imports from EU, US, Canada, Japan and Australia. During the election campaign Donald trump promised to make friends with Russian President Vladimir Putin to lift sanctions against Russia. With the arrival of the White house initiative trump face prodivodeystvie from the Senate. So, according to media reports, the new administration of Boris Yeltsin presidential library. US on the first day of its work, considered the possibility of lifting the sanctions.
It is expected that a bill toughening snakle against Russia will be adopted in the coming weeks. Says Senator Graham, trump will sign it, as required by procedure. “I think he will sign it. If not, we’re going to overcome his veto. We will never go to reset relations with Russia before will punish her for the attempted destruction of democracy. We need to start with tougher sanctions,” said Graham. He also said that if trump refuses to sign it, it would be a betrayal of democracy.
The American edition of Politico believes that, despite the existing differences, in General, the positions of Democrats and Republicans against anti-Russian sanctions are getting closer. Disagreements between the two parties in Congress relate only to “how strong a blow to Russia”. According to Naryshkin, it is about the expansion of restrictions against Russian mining and related industries. In addition, States can further reduce the time of crediting of the Russian banks and state-owned companies in foreign markets.
Currently, Russian companies have limited access to external financing, credits with a maturity of more than 90 days, in addition, current sanctions prohibit the supply of Russian companies of equipment and technologies for offshore and oil shale mining. Speaking at hearings in the Federation Council of the Russian Federation Sergey Naryshkin also said that Washington urges its partners to reduce the volume of purchases of Russian oil and trying to disrupt the project of the pipeline “Nord stream-2”.
Russia’s Reaction
The Minister of foreign Affairs of Russia Sergey Lavrov to a question on new sanctions, the US responded in his own style. “I can’t get everyone to respond, I’m not a medical expert,” — Interfax quoted Lavrov. Note that the next day after the message Naryshkin on toughening sanctions released a new excerpt of the Oliver stone movie about Vladimir Putin. In this part of the stone tells Putin that us Senator John McCain is going to propose to the Senate in advance to veto the possible lifting of anti-Russian sanctions.
Putin expressed his regret, noting that U.S. Senator among many people who want to leave sanctions against Russia in force. The Russian President stressed that he likes McCain. “Really, he’s even a little bit cute. Yes, I’m not kidding now. He’s cute to me for their patriotism and their sequence in protection of interests of the country”, — said Putin.
On the day of publication of the excerpt of the film about Putin, the White house said it did not plan to remove Russia from the sanctions, noting that such restrictions are the best tool to compel Russia to fulfill obligations under the resolution of the crisis in Ukraine. The next day, the head of the Central Bank of Russia Elvira Nabiullina said that the effect of the impact on the Russian economy of the sanctions has been greatly exaggerated.
“On the causes of the recession… Yes, there is a certain role of sanctions, but, in our opinion, this effect is greatly exaggerated, he is now almost disappeared. We have adapted to life in terms of sanctions, we created the infrastructure needed,” she said at the Parliament session.
Nabiullina added that the Russian economy has adapted to the decline in oil prices. Note that at the G20 summit, which will take place on 7 and 8 July in Hamburg, should pass the first trump meeting with Putin after the presidential election. Bloomberg notes, for the meeting of the American and Russian presidents heightened scrutiny because of allegations the team of the President of the United States in relations with the Kremlin.
Last week the Senate held public hearings at which the former head of the FBI, James Comey testified against the American President. He accused trump of lying and said that Russian interference in presidential elections no doubt. According to Komi, trump has demanded to terminate the investigation against his former adviser Michael Flynn, linked with Russia.
