sanctions
23 February 2023
UK ‘too slow to implement sanctions,’ says MP
The UK has been ‘too slow’ in implementing sanctions and needs to toughen enforcement on export controls. So said Labour MP Liam Byrne, speaking in the House of Commons, 20 Feb.
Byrne said the UK needed to ‘move harder and faster to choke to death the oligarchs of war, starting with the Wagner Group and its head, Yezgeny Prigozhin. ‘[The Wagner Group] is mobilising forces on the eastern front in Ukraine, and frankly, it has opened a second front against democracy in Russia as well. It is active in at least five countries and has business interests in at least another 15. It is short-circuiting the sanctions regime by trading in oil, manganese, gold and uranium – you name it – so it is a matter of concern to this House that we are woefully behind the sanctions regimes that the United States and the Europeans have put in place to suffocate Prigozhin and his forces.’
