WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is expected on Thursday to announce the U.S. will impose severe economic sanctions on Russia over what he described as an “unprovoked and unjustified attack” on Ukraine.
In a statement issued just after midnight, Biden did not detail what those “severe” measures would entail but said he was hoping to “rally international condemnation” of the attack. The White House in recent days has ordered sanctions that officials said would target Russian financial institutions and the country’s elites and their family members, including the head of Russia’s Federal Security Service.
“President Putin has chosen a premeditated war that will bring a catastrophic loss of life and human suffering,” Biden said in a statement Wednesday night. “Russia alone is responsible for the death and destruction this attack will bring, and the United States and its allies and partners will respond in a united and decisive way. The world will hold Russia accountable.”
The president also said Wednesday he would allow previously blocked sanctions to take effect against the company behind the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which was built to transport natural gas from Russia directly to Germany. The U.S. “will not hesitate to take further steps if Russia continues to escalate,” he said in a statement.
The announcement came a day after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he had taken steps to halt the process of certifying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which has yet to begin operating.
The sanctions are being imposed as the Kremlin has pressed ahead with its assault on Ukraine, with explosions heard in cities across the country as Russian troops crossed the border by land and sea, despite Moscow’s denials that an invasion was planned.
Video showed Russian armored vehicles advancing into mainland Ukraine from Crimea, the peninsula that Moscow illegally seized eight years ago. Ukrainian air-traffic controllers sealed off the country’s airspace “due to the high risk of aviation safety for civil aviation.”
In response to the attacks, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared martial law in his embattled nation and encouraged his compatriots to take up arms.
