West unleashes swift bans, more crushing penalties on Russia
The European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, announced, from Saturday night to Sunday, the tightening of sanctions against Russia to paralyze its military capabilities, pointing out that the European Union will prevent Russia from accessing the Swift financial system, and will freeze Russia’s financial assets.
The European Commission confirmed that the European Union will paralyze Putin’s capabilities to finance the war machine, threatening Russia to pay a heavy price for the military operation in Ukraine.
The European Commission said the world bears witness to the resilience of the Ukrainian people and army.
The foreign ministers of the European Union will hold a video meeting on Sunday to support the bloc for Ukraine in the face of the Russian military operation, diplomats said Saturday.
The foreign ministers will also discuss imposing more sanctions in light of Germany’s advanced position on Saturday regarding the possibility of excluding Russia from the global banking system Swift after it strongly opposed this matter.
On Saturday, the European Union’s foreign and security policy chief Josep Borrell said that the EU foreign ministers will hold a remote meeting on Sunday to adopt other measures in support of Ukraine in the face of Russia.
“I will present a package of urgent aid to the Ukrainian armed forces, to support them in this heroic battle,” he added on Twitter.
In addition, Elysee announced on Saturday evening that France will tighten economic and financial sanctions against Russia, especially by targeting Moscow’s use of the Swift platform for international financial transactions.
The presidency stated that during a meeting of the Defense Council, President Emmanuel Macron decided to “tighten economic and financial sanctions in coordination with the Europeans and Americans”.
The French presidency also announced that Paris had decided to hand over more defensive military equipment to Ukraine to support it against the attack of the Russian army.
The French presidency said that during a meeting of the Defense Council at the Elysee Palace, chaired by President Emmanuel Macron, “it was decided to hand over additional defense equipment to the Ukrainian authorities in addition to fuel support,” without revealing other details.
