The White House said in a Wednesday press release that the "severe and immediate economic costs" include freezing any assets of Sberbank — Russia's largest financial institution — and Alfa Bank — the country's largest private bank — that touch the U.S. financial system. The sanctions will also prohibit Americans from doing business with those institutions.
The announcement said Biden would also sign a new executive order on Wednesday prohibiting new investment in Russia by "U.S. persons wherever located" in a bid to weaken the country's global competitiveness.
"As long as Russia continues its brutal assault on Ukraine, we will stand unified with our allies and partners in imposing additional costs on Russia for its actions," the White House said.
It also imposed sanctions on various Russian elites and their family members, including Putin's two daughters, the wife and daughter of Russia's foreign minister, and members of Russia's Security Council, including former President and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin. The sanctions freeze any assets they hold in the U.S.
The U.S. Treasury also prohibited Russia from making debt payments with funds subject to U.S. jurisdiction. Per the announcement, Treasury will announce on Thursday additional Russian state-owned enterprises that will face full blocking sanctions from the U.S.
The White House stressed that "essential humanitarian and related activities that benefit the Russian people and people around the world" are exempt from the sanctions, including ensuring the availability of food, safeguarding access to medicine, and enabling telecommunications services.
The announcement comes two days after Biden and other Western leaders said they were planning new sanctions against Russia, as Biden urged that Putin be prosecuted for war crimes.
Russian troops killed more than 300 civilians in Bucha as part of their invasion of Ukraine, the country's leaders said, burying many in a mass grave in an incident reported widely after Russian forces retreated from positions around Kyiv.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in television interviews and comments to the Romanian Parliament on Monday, said those killed had also been tortured, calling the mass killing a "genocide."
In a statement Wednesday, Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, praised the new sanctions for making it harder for Putin to "continue his unlawful aggression," saying his "brutal war will not go unpunished."
"The images we have seen coming from Bucha show just how little regard Vladimir Putin has for innocent human life and the rule of law," Smith said. "He must be held accountable. We must stand with the Ukrainian people, increase pressure on the Russian economy, and do so with our allies and partners in Europe and around the world."
Also Wednesday, the EU said it is considering another round of sanctions against Moscow that could include Russian oil exports, following a fifth set of sanctions rolled out Tuesday that included a ban on Russian coal supplies.
Russia's finance ministry said Wednesday that it was forced to make a scheduled payment of $649.2 million in foreign bonds in rubles after an attempt to pay in dollars was blocked by a correspondent bank, highlighting warnings that Moscow has become a default risk.
--Additional reporting by Daniel Wilson, Ronan Barnard and Joel Poultney. Editing by Adam LoBelia.
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