U.S. Sanctions Russia over Hacking Incidents, Russian Officials Respond
Russian Roulette and the Trump Card
By Areeba Amer
The Progressive Teen Staff Writer
ON THURSDAY, DECEMBER 29TH, THE WHITE HOUSE OFFICIALLY RELEASED A STATEMENT sanctioning nine Russian entities and individuals, as a result of Moscow’s alleged interference throughout election season.
The sanctions were imposed on Russia’s Federal Security Service (Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti or FSB) and its main intelligence directorate (Glavnoe Razedyvatelnoe Upravelenie or GRU), as well as the three companies that “provided material support to the GRU’s cyber-enabled means.”
The Obama Administration will also be closing down the Maryland and New York Russian compounds that were used “for intelligence-related purposes” and has declared “persona non grata” 35 Russian diplomats. In addition, the Department Homeland Security and FBI published a 13-page declassified report titled GRIZZLY STEPPE, which lists all the cyber operations of the Russian intelligence agencies.
“These actions follow repeated private and public warnings that we have issued to the Russian government, and are a necessary and appropriate response to efforts to harm U.S. interests in violation of established international norms of behavior,” the statement read.
According to Reuters news agency, a senior U.S. official said that the diplomats have 72 hours to leave the country and the Maryland and New York compounds will “be denied to all Russian officials by Friday noon.”
The U.S. Treasury department also sanctioned two individuals for the “malicious cyber attacks.” The two individuals were Evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev and Aleksey Alekseyevich Belan and they were added to the list of Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons for “misappropriation of funds or economic resources, trade secrets, personal identifiers, or financial information for private financial gain.”
Following the official statement of the sanctions this afternoon, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitri S. Peskov told journalists there will be a reaction from Moscow that will “deliver significant discomfort to the US side in the same areas.”
“In our point of view such actions of the US current administration are a manifestation of an unpredictable and even aggressive foreign policy,” he said, as per RT News. “As it said before, we consider this decision and these sanctions unjustified and illegal under international law.”
The U.S. Russian Embassy took to their official Twitter account to respond to the sanctions.
“We consider new sanctions of current administration against #Russia, Russian diplomats, their families in the US, not just as unfriendly act,” they wrote. “#Peskov: As we have already said before, we believe such decisions, sanctions to be groundless, illegal from international law point of view.”
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova reacted in a Facebook post on her page.
“Today America, the American people were humiliated by their own President. Not by international terrorists, not by enemy’s troops. This time Washington was slapped by own master, who has complicated the urgent tasks for the incoming team in the extreme,” she said.
Both her and the U.S. Russian Embassy also promised that “tomorrow there will be official statements, countermeasures.”
The Russian Embassy, UK Twitter account also tweeted out a picture of a “lame duck” in response, with a caption accusing President Obama of “Cold War deja vu.”
“President Obama expels 35 diplomats in Cold War deja vu. As everybody, [including American] people, will be glad to see the last of this hapless [Administration],” they wrote.
Prior to the official statement, the Obama administration had already shown a reaction to the alleged information hacking throughout the election. In an interview with the National Public Radio’s Scott Detrow on December 15th, President Obama alluded to the current sanctions.
“I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our election,” he said. “We need to take action. And we will — at the time and place of our choosing.”
Thursday evening, President-elect Donald Trump responded to the sanctions in a statement.
“It’s time for our country to move on to bigger and better things,” he said. “Nevertheless, in the interest of our country and its great people, I will meet with leaders of the intelligence community next week in order to be updated on the facts of this situation.”
