TORONTO (Canada), February 28 Canada on Monday banned its financial institutions from conducting “transactions” with the Bank of Russia to prevent them from using their international currency reserves and limit Moscow’s ability to finance the invasion of Ukraine. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced on Twitter that the ban was effective “immediately” and that Canada had made the decision “in coordination” with the rest of the G7 nations. “We will continue to work closely together to hold Russia accountable for its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine,” Trudeau said. In addition, Canada imposed an asset freeze and ban on operations with Russian sovereign wealth funds. “Canada and its allies continue to take coordinated action to ensure that a Russian invasion of Ukraine would amount to a strategic failure,” Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement. Freeland added that the measures taken by the United States, Canada, the European Union and their allies in recent days are unprecedented, describing the “historic” decision to ban transactions with the Bank of Russia, as it is the first time that the Central Bank has banned transactions with the Bank of Russia. From the country of the Group of Twenty punished in this way. The sanctions against the Bank of Russia come on top of Western countries’ decision to exclude some Russian banks from the SWIFT system of bank payments. Canada was one of the first countries to publicly express support for the measure. Also today, Rogers Communications, one of the largest in Canada, stopped broadcasting the state channel RT, which is one of the tools of propaganda in Moscow. On Sunday, Bell, one of Canada’s major telecoms companies, has already made the decision to exclude RT from its television schedule. In addition, LCBO, the monopoly on the sale of alcoholic beverages in the province of Ontario, the largest in Canada, decided to remove products made in Russia, especially vodka, from its stores. On Sunday, Canadian Transport Minister Omar Al-Ghubra announced the closure of Canadian airspace to Russian airlines in response to the invasion of Ukraine, after several European countries took the same measure. EFE jcr / er / rrt
