By Jimmy Quinn
Wednesday, June 29, 2022
Representative Michael McCaul (R., Texas) hit the Biden
administration for failing to respond forcefully to five Chinese firms’ evasion
of sanctions targeting Russia’s war effort. His criticism follows the Commerce
Department’s announcement yesterday that the firms are supplying
Russia’s military–industrial base.
Commerce placed the five companies, which sell electronic
components, on the entity list, meaning that U.S. firms are prohibited from
exporting to them. McCaul, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs
Committee, ripped into the administration for declining to go further than
that.
“Deputy Secretary Sherman promised ‘consequences’ if the
CCP provided ‘material support’ to Russia, but the administration’s feeble
concept of ‘consequences’ will do little to deter the CCP’s ongoing support for
Putin’s war crimes,” he said, citing Sherman’s comments during a hearing in
April.
In his statement today, McCaul said the administration
should have imposed financial sanctions to block those companies from doing any
international business.
“Providing ‘continued support of Russia’s military
efforts’ should result in significant sanctions on those offending companies,”
said McCaul, adding that the administration’s response, “is astonishingly weak,
and could further the threat Russia poses to Ukrainian civilians and soldiers.”
Although the Commerce Department said the designated
firms are supplying Russian “entities of concern,” it did not make a
determination as to whether the Chinese government is facilitating their
sanctions-evasion activity. Last month, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said
the U.S. has not identified “systematic” Chinese efforts to blow through the
West’s sanctions and export controls targeting the Russian defense industry.
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