By the end of January the United States will publish "Kremlin report". This report will include a list of officials and businessmen close to Russian president who, according to the authors of thid report, contributed to Russia's "illegal" actions, such as participation in the events in Crimea and Ukraine, as well as "interference in American presidential elections".
According to the program director of the Russian Council on International Affairs Ivan Timofeyev, the report, which will be submitted by the Treasury Department to the Congress, has already attracted attention of the media: "Everybody is waiting for it, everybody want to find our what names will this report include. The report suggests to prepare a list of Russian oligarchs close to Russian political authorities, Russian president as well as members of their families. It will be a detailed report on their business, their investments in Russia and abroad. It's clear that the fact that such list is prepared by foreign state is an unfriendly step, since it's essentially interference in sovereign affairs of the Russian Federation."
Meanwhile, Timofeyev believes that the hype surrounding this report doesn't reflect the entire picture: "The things is that in 2018, there will be six other reports on various areas of sanction policy. In particular, there will be two more reports of the Treasury. The first one is about whether to expand sanctions on Russia's sovereign debt obligations. The second one, which will be published in August, is about crimes recorded by US financial intelligence that involved Russian individuals or Russian companies. In addition, there will be reports on Russian media, which, according to the US, were actively involved in the so-called Russian aggression, in a hybrid war, as well as in Russia's interference in the affairs of Europe and Eurasian countries.
There will also be a separate report on "interference in elections" and a separate report of the State Department on Ukraine's energy security, which will contain a broader statement about negative, aggressive role of Russia in European energy market."
According to expert, each report will be hinder attempts to establish better Russian-American relations.
Timofeyv also noted that American sanctions are fundamentally different from the EU sanctions: "The EU normative acts mention only one issue - Ukrainian issue, while in American legislation gathered all possible and impossible dissatisfaction with Russia. This includes Ukraine, 'cyber intervention', the Middle East, human rights, corruption, non-proliferation issues. People say Russia and the United States should cooperate in Syria and the Middle East, where they have common interests, such as the fight against terrorism. But if we look at the American Act of August 2nd, we will see that Russia is listed there as an opponent of the United States in the Middle East, and that the United States consider Russia's Middle East policy wrong and hostile. This legislation allows to impose specific sanctions when it comes to the Middle East dossier. In other words, they created a framework in which any issue can be used to set back relations with Russia."
