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The EU announced a series of overwhelming sanctions against Russia in response to its attack on Ukraine, yet both the European bloc and US President Joe Biden’s measures bypassed what was considered one of the toughest possible sanctions against Russia. Moscow: its disconnection from the international payment system Swift.
European Union finance ministers urgently approved a second package of sanctions against Russia for attacking Ukraine, while acknowledging that it would incur economic costs for the 27-nation bloc. “It is clear that while implementing a package of major sanctions against Russia, this will also have consequences for the EU economy. We are seeing a concern already in the financial markets.
“But in this situation, we as the European Union, as a Western democratic world, must respond,” said Valdis Dombrovskis, the EU’s executive vice president and trade commissioner. The strongest voices against Moscow’s secession from the Swift system were Germany and Italy. Why did this happen? Both the German and Italian governments openly expressed their fear that such a move would not only hit the Russian financial system, but would also have a tremendous impact on European banks themselves.
Germany and other EU countries have also used SWIFT to pay for Russian gas. “If the EU were to take this step, ‘there would be a great risk that the Germans would no longer be supplied with gas or left first by Russia,'” German Finance Minister Christian Lindner himself told TV ARD. On the other hand, it is also the example of Iran. In 2012, the European Council under US pressure removed the Islamic Republic from the Swift system, and the consequences at first seemed devastating. But in the long run, they did not have the expected effect, because even without his help, Iranian banking managed to implement other forms of communication.
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