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The Biden administration on Thursday imposed new sanctions on Russia and expelled diplomats from allegedly Moscow’s cyberattacks on the United States.
According to the White House, President Joe Biden has signed an executive order that “provides strengthened authorities to address and demonstrate the administration’s determination to deter Russia’s entire range of harmful foreign activities.” news release..
The Executive Order was designed to send the White House a message to the Kremlin that “if Russia continues or escalate unstable international actions, it will impose costs in a strategic and economically influential way.” .. “Fair democratic elections” and the US system.
The White House news release also referred to Russia’s alleged attempt to “engage and promote malicious cyber activities against the United States and its allies and partners.”
Russia was accused of fostering a cyberattack on SolarWinds software used by many federal agencies in December. In the intrusion, Russian hackers infect widely used software with malicious code, and at least nine agencies that U.S. authorities believe are intelligence-gathering activities aimed at uncovering government secrets. It is believed to have made it possible to access the network.
According to the government, “a breach of the SolarWinds software supply chain could spy on or disrupt more than 16,000 computer systems around the world.” “The scope of this compromise is national security and public security concerns. In addition, it overburdens most private sector victims who have to bear the extraordinarily high costs to mitigate this case. I will. “
The executive order released Thursday included sanctions on six Russian companies supporting the country’s cyber activities, and 32 individuals were also sanctioned.
The Biden administration added that the ten exiled diplomats included representatives of Russian intelligence.
Despite the new order, Biden believes that a summit should be held with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss “the problems facing our relationship,” said National Security Adviser. Official Jake Sullivan said in a CNN interview Thursday. He added that US-Russia relations could be “stable and predictable.”
“President Biden struggled with the fact that we take action this week, but he also said he wanted to achieve that stability in this relationship. If Putin was ready to do so, I would. We believe we can. Find a course that doesn’t lead to a cycle of conflict, “Sullivan said.
This action is the second major round of sanctions imposed by the Biden administration on the Russian government. Last month, the United States sanctioned seven mid-level and senior Russian officials, more than 12 government agencies, the treatment of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and subsequent imprisonment.
The White House decided to retain the US ambassador to Russia appointed by Trump and invited Putin to the Climate Change Conference in late April.
It was not immediately clear what other actions were planned for Russia. Officials have previously stated that they expect to take both visible and invisible actions.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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