Russia will be expelled from SWIFT. The decision has not yet been made official, but the technical preparation to approve and implement the sanction has already begun, wrote the Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Dmytro Kuleba on his Facebook page.
“We pushed, and we pushed, until we made it happen. The entire Ukrainian diplomatic apparatus, from the President of Ukraine to the attaché at the Ukrainian embassy, was involved in this. Ukrainian diplomats dedicate this victory to all those who are defending Ukraine,” wrote Kuleba.
Sources close to the negotiation over sanction policy told LB.ua that after Hungary and Cyprus agreed to expel Russia from SWIFT, only Germany’s position stood in the way. In order to expel a country from SWIFT, the United States and all member states of the European Union must agree to it. Radio Svoboda editor Rikard Jozwiak reported today that Germany had finally approved the decision as well.
SWIFT stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication. It is a payment system that is controlled by the National Bank of Belgium and representatives of the central banks of the United States, Great Britain, the EU, Japan, Russia, China, and others. SWIFT delivers secure messages of more than 11,000 financial institutions and businesses in more than 200 countries and territories.
Only one country has been expelled from SWIFT in the history of the system. In 2012, following an EU directive, SWIFT ended its relationship with Iran as part of a series of measures to curtail the Islamic Republic’s nuclear programme.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi expressed his hope that Germany and Hungary would be brave enough to support the decision to expel Russia from SWIFT.
“The blood of innocent Ukrainian men, women, and children will be on the hands of those who block the expulsion of Russia from SWIFT,” said the Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dmytro Kuleba. He also called on the international community to isolate Russia from the world entirely, expel its ambassadors, impose an oil embargo, and destroy the aggressor’s economy.