Russia expels 10 US diplomats as part of retaliation for sanctions

MOSCOW: Russia has delivered a sharp response to the Biden administration’s sanctions, blacklisting senior officials and targeting the US diplomatic mission, including the US ambassador, with potentially paralysing restrictions.

In a tit-for-tat response to US sanctions for elections interference and the recent SolarWinds hack, Moscow said on Friday that it would expel 10 US diplomats from the country. Biden hits Russia with new sanctions in response to election meddlingRead moreThe Russian foreign ministry also barred entry to eight current and former US officials, including the US attorney general, the heads of the NSA, FBI, Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the domestic policy council director, Susan Rice. The former national security adviser John Bolton and former CIA director James Woolsey were also barred from Russia.

And in a dramatic move, Moscow also recommended that the US recall its ambassador, John Sullivan. Russia recalled its own ambassador to Washington last month after Joe Biden agreed with a journalist when asked if he considered Vladimir Putin “a killer”.

Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said that Putin “has endorsed these measures in response to the absolutely hostile and unprovoked actions that Washington has announced with regard to Russia, our citizens, individuals and legal entities and with regard to our financial system”. The sanctions row is the worst since the 2018 Salisbury poisonings, when Washington expelled 60 Russian diplomats and closed the Seattle consulate following the use of a novichok nerve agent in the UK by men believed to be Russian military intelligence agents. Russia responded by expelling 60 US diplomats and closing the US consulate in St Petersburg.

Russian diplomats have lashed out at the UK for joining the US in condemning Russia’s international cyber-espionage efforts, although no sanctions measures were announced against the UK (Russia has extended a flight ban ostensibly due to the UK coronavirus strain). Moscow will also expel five Polish diplomats in a retaliatory move.

Anger has been growing in the United States over alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 and 2020 US elections and Russian intelligence agencies’ cyber-espionage campaign, culminating in the SolarWinds supply chain hack that has compromised nine US federal agencies and more than 16,000 computers, according to the US government.

The sanctions also appear to be making up for lost time, as the Trump administration was seen as failing to confront the Kremlin for its aggressive moves.

In the new sanctions, the White House signalled it could target Russia’s economy by enforcing a ban on buying newly issued rouble bonds, a move that could drive down demand for Russia’s sovereign debt if it is extended to secondary markets.

Russia cannot similarly threaten the US economy, so compensated by targeting what it has called US influence operations in the country, saying it plans to ban NGOs and funds run by the US state department and other government organisations.