mayor. his detention is the first known instance of a ukrainian political official being detained and investigated by russia or russian-backed forces since this invasion began. president biden announced new sanctions on russia today. the united states will ban luxury russian items like vodka and seafood, plus along with the g7 and the european union, the u.s. will move to revoke russia s most favored nation trading status. revoking pntr for russia is going to make it harder for russia to do business with the united states and doing it in eunice on with other nations to make up half of the global economy will be another crushing blow to the russian economy. it is already suffering very badly from our sanctions. let s welcome ambassador william taylor, former u.s. ambassador to ukraine. mr. ambassador, these sanctions have increased over the last two plus weeks now. what is the impact of what the president announced today?
to deny most favoured nation status to deny most favoured nation status to russia. most favoured nation status designation means two countries have agreed to trade with each other under the best possible terms. low tariffs, few barriers to trade, and the highest possible imports are allowed. in the united states we call this permanent normal trade relations, but it is the same thing. revoking pntr for russia will make it harderfor thing. revoking pntr for russia will make it harder for russia to do business with the united states and doing it in unison with other nations that make up half the global economy will be another crushing blow to the russian economy that has already suffered very badly from our sanctions. i want to thank speaker pelosi, leaders schumer, mcconnell, and representatives kneel and brady for their bipartisan leadership on this in congress. i would like to offer a special thanks to speaker pelosi who has been a strong
impact on its own on the russian economy but what the white house has been emphasizing is that this decision was not done by the u.s. on its own. this decision was made in partnership with its european allies, who are much bigger trade partners with russia. all of these countries taken together and it will have an impact on the russian economy, the white house has been arguing. each of the countries are going to have to pass this in the legislative bodies. there is bipartisan support for this here so we expect that to pass easily. the president gave a speech about his decision at the white house yesterday. he explained what he thought the impact would be of this move. listen to what he had to say. revoking pntr for russia will make it harder for russia to do business with the united states and doing it in unison with other nations to make up half of the global economy will be
advocate for revoking pntr and has agreed to hold off that in the house until we can line up our key allies to keep us in unison. unity among allies is important from my perspective at least. standing for democracy in ukraine, pushing russia s aggression, should not be one of those divisive issues. the free world is coming together to confront putin. our two parties at home are leading the way. with that bipartisan cooperation i am looking forward to signing into law the bill revoking pntr, which is again, most people think of it as most favoured nation status. we are also taking a further step, banning imports of goods from sectors of the russian economy including seafood, vodka and diamonds and we will continue to squeeze putin. the g seven will seek to bar russia from
failed to topple the government in kyiv. they ve resorted to terrorizeing innocent civilians. in central ukraine the shoe factory was obliterated. mariupol, 1300 people have been killed. that number likely to rise. meantime kyiv is bracing for the arrival of that massive russian military convoy. new satellite images appear to show the convoy fanning out into towns along the city outskirts. last hour president biden calling for the u.s. to take new steps to punish putin. president biden: revoking pntr for russia will make it harder for russia to do business with the united states. and doing it in unison with other nations, that make up half of the global economy will be another crushing blow to the russian he con that that s already suffering badly from our sanctions. putin is an aggressor, the