BP’s exit opens a new front in the West’s campaign against Russia

Feb 28 (Reuters) – Energy giant BP has opened a new front in the West’s campaign to isolate Russia’s economy, with its decision to withdraw from the oil-rich country, the most aggressive move yet by a company in response to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

Western allies have stepped up efforts to punish Russia with new sanctions, including closing their airspace to Russian aircraft, cutting some of its banks from the SWIFT financial network, and limiting Moscow’s ability to deploy its $630 billion foreign reserves — measures expected to crush the country. Economie. Read more

The ruble fell nearly 30% to an all-time low against the dollar on Monday. Read more

BP, Russia’s largest foreign investor, said it would give up its stake in state oil company Rosneft. (ROSN.MM) At a cost of up to $25 billion, it is halving its oil and gas reserves. Read more

The British company’s surprise move highlights other Western companies with operations in Russia amid growing pressure from governments to tighten the financial noose on Moscow after it launched the biggest attack on a European country since World War Two. Read more

Equinor Energy Group (EQNR.OL)The Norwegian state-owned said by a large majority on Monday that it would begin to divest from its joint ventures in Russia. Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, will also divest its Russian assets, which are worth about 25 billion Norwegian kroner ($2.80 billion). Read more

In a video call on Sunday, the head of the European Union’s internal market told Alphabet CEOs (GOOGL.O) and its YouTube unit to ban users who promote war propaganda as part of measures to stop misinformation about Ukraine.

The European Union has banned Russian media outlets RT, Sputnik, Alphabet’s Google and Russia’s state-owned RT and other channels from receiving money for ads on their websites, apps and YouTube videos, similar to the move Facebook took after the invasion. Read more

restricted area

In an unprecedented move, European countries and Canada have moved to close their airspace to Russian aircraft and the United States is considering similar action, according to US officials.

United Parcel Service Inc., based in the United States (UPS.N) and FedEx Corp (FDX.N)Two of the world’s largest logistics companies said they had halted delivery services to Russia and Ukraine. Read more

Large parts of the Russian economy will be a no-go zone for Western banks and financial firms after the decision to isolate some of its banks from SWIFT, a secure messaging system used in trillions of dollars worth of transactions around the world.

Even neutral Switzerland will likely follow the European Union in punishing Russia and freezing Russian assets, its president said on Sunday. Read more

Russians queued at automated teller machines over the weekend, worried that the new sanctions would lead to cash shortages and disrupt payments. Read more

Additional reporting by Ron Bosso and Dmitriy Zhdanikov in London and Fu Yun Che in Brussels: Writing by Carmel Kremens: Editing by Grant McCall

Our criteria: Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.