The United States sanctions Lukashenko and his wife for corruption and human rights violations

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MADRID, March 15. (Royals Blue) –

The Government of the United States announced this Tuesday sanctions against the president of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, and his wife, within a battery of measures against Belarusian and Russian individuals with which Washington wants to penalize corruption and human rights violations.

The US Treasury Department has claimed that Lukashenko has used his power to benefit people he trusts, allegedly in exchange for his own enrichment. Thus, he facilitated business activity and even smuggling, within a network that Washington also extends to the family of the Belarusian president.

On the other hand, the Belarusian regime has taken measures to punish those who disagree with the official line, for example by inspecting companies that questioned the result of the controversial 2020 elections or pressuring property owners to raise rents.

The director of the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, Andrea Gacki, has pointed out that sanctions such as those adopted this Tuesday demonstrate the commitment of the Joe Biden Administration to the imposition of “concrete and significant” measures against those foreign leaders who engage in corrupt activities and violate human rights.

Thus, although the punishments are not strictly linked to the current Russian military offensive on Ukraine, in which Lukashenko has clearly positioned himself on Russia’s side, Gacki has taken the opportunity to demand an end to this “brutal war” and condemn the attacks on corridors humanitarians.

The Treasury list also incorporates the names of the Russian judge Natalia Mushnikova, for her involvement in the plot to cover up the alleged abuses of the activist Sergei Magnitsky, who died in 2009, and several officials linked to the persecution of the Chechen leadership of the NGO Memorial.