Jakarta –
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Thursday (24/2), Western countries this week have prepared several sanctions against Russia, as a form of their support for Ukraine. The announcement of the sanctions will be a move by the United States, the European Union, Britain and several other countries to test Russia’s ‘economic stronghold’.
Less than 24 hours, after Russia’s incursion into Ukraine from the North, South and East, United States President Joe Biden launched sweeping sanctions designed to damage Russia’s economy. The targeting of sanctions includes financial institutions, disabling military troops, to the industrial sector.
Since 2014, the US and its Western allies have imposed sanctions on Moscow. This means that Russian president Vladimir Putin has been trying to strengthen their economy, to be able to withstand some of the sanctions that will be even more severe in the future.
Reporting from CNN International (27/2/2022), fear of sanctions that may be launched by some parties, made the Russian stock market fall 33% last Thursday. Since then, Russia has been trying to recover some of the losses.
However, the ruble (the currency in Russia) continues to trade even though it is near record lows against the dollar and euro. The fall in the value of the ruble, was able to shrink the value of the Russian economy by $800 billion.
During the same period, Moscow has tried to stop the process of the ruble falling in value gradually or even all at once. This was done in order to develop a strategy to restore the economy.
The Russian economy is dependent on oil commodities. In addition, efforts to fortify the economy are also carried out by limiting government spending, and maintaining their foreign currency reserves.
Putin’s economic planning has been able to increase the production of certain goods at home by blocking equivalent products from abroad. Meanwhile, Moscow has raised an international reserve fund of US$ 630 billion. This number is a very large number, when compared to most other countries.
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