The United States has designated 212 Russia-related individuals and entities for sanctionable conduct since January 2017, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Marshall Billingslea said in a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Thursday.
WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 13th September, 2018) The United States has designated 212 Russia-related individuals and entities for sanctionable conduct since January 2017, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Marshall Billingslea said in a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Thursday.
"Since January 2017, Treasury has sanctioned 212 Russian-related individuals and entities for a broad range of sanctions conduct," Billingslea said.
Of the 212 designations, 136 of those were Ukraine-related sanctions imposed through the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), he added.
The United States passed the CAATSA legislation in August 2017 in response in part to Russia's alleged interference in the 2016 US presidential election.
Russia has repeatedly denied allegations of meddling in the vote, calling such accusations absurd and invented to excuse the election loss of a presidential candidate as well as deflect public opinion from actual instances of election fraud, corruption and other pressing issues.
Relations between Moscow and Washington deteriorated over situation in Ukraine and Crimea's rejoining Russia in 2014. The same year, the US imposed sanctions against Russia over its alleged interference in the Ukrainian conflict.
Crimea rejoined Russia in 2014 after 97 percent of the peninsula's residents voted in favor of the move in a referendum. The reunification was not recognized by Ukraine or Western states, which subsequently imposed economic and political sanctions on Moscow. Russia has repeatedly stated that the referendum was conducted in compliance with international law.
