- Russian officials will face asset freezes and travel bans
following their involvement in the forced deportation of
Ukrainian children and the spreading of hate-inciting propaganda.
- Announcement comes as the UK puts support for Ukraine and its
pursuit of peace at the top of its agenda during its month-long
presidency of the UN Security Council.
- In a meeting of the UN Security Council today the Foreign
Secretary will stand alongside Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro
Kuleba to call for a just, lasting peace in the country.
The Foreign Secretary, has today (17th July)
announced 14 new sanctions in response to Russia’s attempts to
destroy Ukrainian national identity, including 11 against those
involved in the forced deportation of Ukrainian children.
Today’s announcement comes ahead of the Foreign Secretary’s
speech at the UN Security Council (UNSC), where he will highlight
the far-reaching implications of Russia’s war, call on Russia to
renew the Black Sea Grain Initiative, and outline the need for a
just, lasting peace in Ukraine.
Among the designations announced today are Russian officials
Ksenia Mishonova, Commissioner for Children’s Rights in the
Moscow Region, and Sergey Kravtsov, Minister of Education of
Russia.
These individuals have played an insidious role in Russia’s
calculated programme of deportation, designed to erase Ukrainian
cultural and national identity. Over 19,000 Ukrainian children
have been forcibly deported to Russia or temporarily Russian
controlled territory by Russian authorities.
Many deported children are relocated to a network of re-education
camps in illegally annexed Crimea and mainland Russia, where they
are exposed to Russia-centric academic, cultural, patriotic, and
military education.
This latest package of designations follows the UK’s sanctioning
of Russian Children’s Rights Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova in
June 2022 for her alleged involvement in the forced transfer and
adoption of Ukrainian children.
Also sanctioned today are 2 Russian propagandists responsible for
spreading abhorrent propaganda designed to incite violence and
hatred towards Ukraine and its people, including Anton Krasovsky,
a former Russia Today presenter, who claimed live on air that
Ukrainian children should be drowned and burned.
Olga Lyubimova, the Russian Culture Minister, is additionally
targeted for using her position to support the Russian state’s
damaging anti-Ukrainian policies.
Foreign Secretary, , said:
In his chilling programme of forced child deportation, and the
hate-filled propaganda spewed by his lackeys, we see Putin’s true
intention - to wipe Ukraine from the map.
Today’s sanctions hold those who prop up Putin’s regime to
account, including those who would see Ukraine destroyed, its
national identity dissolved, and its future erased.
The UK and international partners have implemented the most
severe package of sanctions ever imposed on a major economy.
Over 1,600 individuals and entities have been sanctioned since
the start of the invasion, including 29 banks with global assets
worth £1 trillion, over 130 oligarchs with a combined net worth
of over £145 billion, and over £20 billion worth of UK-Russia
trade.
Later today, in New York, the Foreign Secretary will use his
speech during a UK-chaired session of the UNSC to call for a
just, lasting peace in Ukraine and highlight Russia’s
barbaric forced deportation of Ukrainian children.
He is expected to say:
Ukraine wants peace. We want peace. The whole world wants peace.
Peace will bring home Ukraine’s lost children – and feed the
hungry of the world.
The devastating effects of Putin’s aggression can be felt in
every corner of the globe. Vital grain supplies from Ukraine will
be cut off and millions will face exacerbated food insecurity if
Russia does not agree to a renewal of the Black Sea Grain
Initiative today.
