Russia is pressuring governments including India behind the scenes, threatening to upend defense and energy deals unless they help block expected moves aimed at turning Moscow into a financial pariah state over its invasion of Ukraine, the report said.
According to the Bloomberg report, the officials in NATO countries familiar with the situation offer a rare insight into how Russia is targeting commercial partners ahead of a June meeting of the global watchdog against money-laundering.
“The Financial Action Task Force, an inter-governmental organization that sets standards for combating dirty money, suspended Russia from membership in February and Ukraine is pushing for the body to impose further restrictions by adding Moscow to its ‘black list’ or ‘gray list’,” it said.
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It added: “Blacklisting by the FATF would put Putin's government in the same company as North Korea, Iran and Myanmar, the only countries with that designation, and plunge his economy even deeper into isolation over the war. If the measure comes to pass, member states as well as banks, investment houses and payment-processing companies would be obliged to conduct enhanced due diligence and in the most serious cases take counter-measures to protect the international financial system.”
“Many countries in the so-called Global South including India have stayed mostly neutral over Russia's aggression against Ukraine. That balancing act was on display at a Group of Seven summit in Japan this past weekend, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy met in person for the first time since the war began,” it mentioned.
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“While there's no indication of any immediate shift in India's position, the meeting likely made uncomfortable viewing for Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose own travels have been restricted since the invasion and an arrest warrant for alleged war crimes issued in March by the International Criminal Court,” it said.
