UK says crippling sanctions on Russia could be lifted if its forces withdraw from Ukraine

The United Kingdom on Sunday proposed that the crippling sanctions on Russian entities and oligarchs, businesses airlines, and private banks can be lifted if Russian forces halt the offensive inside Ukraine and withdraw all its troops, committing to end month-long aggression. UK’s Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, in an interview with the British newspaper The Sunday Telegraph, said that sanctions against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime may be reversed should Moscow abandon the war. 

"What we know is that Russia signed up to multiple agreements they simply don’t comply with. So there needs to be hard levers. Of course, sanctions are a hard lever," she told the paper. 

“Those sanctions should only come off with a full ceasefire and withdrawal, but also commitments that there will be no further aggression," he added.

A total of £500 billion Russian assets frozen

Truss further stated that Russia has an opportunity to have its tough sanctions removed that have had a dire impact on the economy and have hit the businesses. She, although, warned Russia against further aggression in the future in case such terms were met. “That is a real lever that I think can be used,” she said. UK’s Foreign secretary informed that a “negotiations unit” will have to be formulated in the Foreign Office to broker such a deal and the peace talks.

West has frozen a total of £500 billion Russian assets and more than £150 billion worth of assets to the oligarchs and Russian entities. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy earlier rejected Russia’s demands to “surrender” asserting that his troops would not give away territory in exchange of peace talks. UK Foreign Secretary’s remarks echo US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s statement, that the punitive financial measures and trade embargoes on Moscow, asset freezes are "not designed to be permanent”. The sanctions may be removed "in effect, irreversible" withdrawal of Russian troops, Blinken had said. 

Earlier in his address in Brussels, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson iterated that Ukraine is "not alone" in its fight against Russia's invasion. He warned the Russian president against using chemical weapons in Kyiv, saying that the consequences would be "catastrophic for him”. Britain, he said, will not standby as Putin "vents his fury on Ukraine" and will continue supplying defensive weaponry to counter the Russian threat. He announced a new deployment of UK troops to Bulgaria aside from those in Poland and in Estonia.