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While the Navalny case was a vivid example of Russian brutality – his FSB assailants harassed him as he traveled through Europe and apparently applied the nerve agent to his underwear – the Biden administration sees SolarWinds as a more direct attack on the United States. Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, said the answer “won’t just be sanctions” and also hinted at some sort of secret response.
But in the Navalny case, only sanctions were announced – and they may have little effect. History suggests that sanctions work better, if at all, in smaller, less powerful countries, and only over time. They are often used to signal disapproval without expecting too much behavior change.
As Carl Bildt, former Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Sweden, said: “Sanctions have become very popular in Congress and they are also becoming popular with the EU. If you don’t have other instruments, sanctions are very popular. “
In 2018, the Trump administration announced sanctions against Russia for the use of a nerve agent against Sergei Skripal, a former Russian double agent living in Britain, and his daughter, Yulia, and deported dozens of Russian diplomats. But it proved little dissuasive for the FSB using the same technique against Mr Navalny and Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian dissident who was poisoned, in 2015 and 2017, and nearly died both times.
A senior US official said the action announced on Tuesday matched in many ways the designations the Europeans had already made. The official said the main effort was to ensure that the United States and Europe were “on the same page” after several months in which European sanctions went beyond those imposed by Washington.
The European Union on Monday approved sanctions against four senior Russian officials believed to be responsible for the prosecution and imprisonment of Mr. Navalny.
The decision, approved by member states, entered into force on Tuesday and marks the first time the European Union has used new powers under its version of the Magnitsky law, which allows Brussels to impose penalties on violators human rights around the world.
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