The sanctions record: the first weeks

I have watched sanctions debates in this region for twenty years. They usually take months, and they usually arrive diluted. What happened after February was neither.

Selected russian banks were disconnected from SWIFT. russian central bank reserves held in Western jurisdictions were immobilised — the measure that mattered most, because it removed the ability to defend a currency with money held abroad. Airspace across the European Union, Canada and the United States was closed to russian aircraft. Export controls were placed on advanced technology, semiconductors and the components that industry cannot easily substitute.

Why the coordination mattered more than any single measure

A restriction adopted by one jurisdiction is a routing problem. The same restriction adopted simultaneously by the European Union, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Switzerland, Australia and others is a structural one. For anyone who works with international trade compliance, that difference is the whole story.

For companies here, the practical consequence arrived immediately: counterparty screening became a daily process rather than an annual one, and every contract needed reading again.