By Aaron Miller-
Sweeping sanctions imposed by U.S president Joe Biden against Russia will stoke tensions between the two countries, and have inevitable consequences, the United States has been warned.
The Biden administration on Thursday imposed sweeping sanctions against Russia in relation to Russia’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 US election.
Biden has been emphatic of his goals for improved relations, rater than an escalation of tensions. despite denials from Donald Trump that Russia meddled in both the 2016 and 2020 elections.
Russia’s ministry spokesperson, Maria Zakharova told reporters that consequences for the sanctions were inevitable . Ms Zakharova said: “Such aggressive behaviour will certainly be strongly rebuffed, and the response to sanctions will be inevitable.” .“Washington must realise that it will pay for the degradation of bilateral relations
According to Biden’s team, the Trump campaign handed over polling data to Russian agents who in turn passed it onto Russian intelligence.
Trump’s 2016 campaign chief Paul Manafort gave Russian intelligence agencies ‘sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy,’ while Manafort’s associate, Konstantin Kilimnik, ‘also sought to promote the narrative that Ukraine, not Russia, had interfered in the 2016 US presidential election,’ the US Treasury Department said.
On Thursday, President Biden expelled 10 Russian diplomats for their role in election interference, which sent a strong message to Vladimr Putin, who recently signed a dictatorial law allowing himself to remain president until 2036.
The sanctions, which were the Biden administration’s largest punitive action against the Kremlin yet, also targeted six Russian cybersecurity companies deemed to be involved in the SolarWinds hack, as well as 32 individuals and entities deemed to be involved in efforts to influence the outcome of the 2020 US presidential election.
The Biden administration also barred US financial institutions from buying rouble bonds newly issued by Russia’s central bank or other large financial institutions, targeting the country’s sovereign debt and its broader economy.
White House on Thursday afternoon, Biden played down the severity of the actions, saying the US wanted a stable, predictable relationship and was “not looking to kick off a cycle of escalation and conflict with Russia”.
The US’s recent sanctions also revealed that Kilimnik was the Russian operative to pass on election data between Trump’s people to Russian agencies, despite the Treasury Department offering a $250,000 reward for information leading to his arrest.
US Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, said in a statement that it was ‘the start of a new US campaign against Russian malign behaviour’.
The Treasury accused Kilimnik of being involved, stating that he ‘provided the Russian Intelligence Services with sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy,’ which were handed over throughout 2016 by Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and his deputy Rick Gates, and documented but not substantiated in the infamous Mueller report.
Until this point, it hadn’t been clarified whether Kilimnik had actually passed over sensitive information directly to the Russian government, but now it’s been confirmed he did.
Sanctions
The recent sanctions were levied against 16 individuals and entities in total, including Russia’s first deputy chief of staff, Alexei Gromov, who is said to have used ‘its media apparatus that sought to exacerbate tensions in the United States by discrediting the 2020 US election process’.
In March this year, the US government formed a report that concluded Russia tried to disseminate false information that heavily criticised Biden and pandered towards Trump.
Some of the above sanctions were also handed to outlets that were controlled by Russian intel services, as a means of hiding its government’s attempt to spread disinformation and influence American voters.
A formal statement later on Thursday, Joe Biden said the nature of the US measures were designed to be measured and proportionate, expressing his hopes that he and Vladimir Putin, whom he had warned about the coming sanctions earlier in the week, would be able to stabilise the US-Russian relationship. But at the same time he warned against any Russian military moves in Ukraine.
“I was clear with President Putin that we could have gone further, but I chose not to do so. I chose to be proportional. The United States is not looking to kick off a cycle of escalation and conflict with Russia,” Biden said in televised remarks from the White House. He confirmed he had offered Putin a summit meeting in Europe this summer, and their aides were discussing arrangements.
“Throughout our long history of competition, our two countries have been able to find ways to manage tensions, and to keep them from escalating out of control,” the president said. “I expressed my belief that communication between the two of us personally and directly was essential to moving forward to a more effective relationship.”
He said he had made clear US support for Ukrainian territorial integrity. “Now is the time to de-escalate,” Biden said. “The way forward is through thoughtful dialogue and diplomatic process.”
Dominic Raab, Britain’s foreign secretary, expressed awareness of Russia’s actions to undermine their democracies. “[We] are calling out Russia’s malicious behaviour, to enable our international partners and businesses at home to better defend and prepare themselves against this kind of action,” he said. “The UK will continue to work with allies to call out Russia’s malign behaviour where we see it.”
The UK’s security review, published last month, identified Russia as the “most acute threat” to its national and collective security, citing “hostile and destabilising” activity by Moscow.