Things are going towards SWIFT Ban for Russia

Things are going towards SWIFT Ban for Russia. 

Canada, the United States, Britain, and the European Union said Friday that they could remove Russia from the SWIFT global interbank payment system in a new round of sanctions to stop Russia from taking over Ukraine.

U.S. and European officials say that in the next few days, two European countries that had been against kicking Russia out of the world’s main international payments network could change their minds. Germany and Italy are two of them.

It would hurt Russian trade and make it more difficult for Russian businesses to do business if they did that. 

SWIFT is a secure messaging system that makes it easy to make quick payments across borders and is the main way to pay for international trade.

MORE: Russia and Ukraine Soldiers engage in heavy fighting in Kyiv.

Western countries have been putting together a lot of sanctions against Russia this week, which would be the next step. On Friday, they put sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

It was the biggest attack by one country against another in Europe since World War II when Russian forces launched it early on Thursday.

Earlier this week, sanctions were put in place against Russian banks, oligarchs, and exports.

A new round of sanctions could be in the works after Russia is banned from SWIFT, the head of the European Parliament said on Friday.

This is good news for Italy, which had been reluctant to take that step. On Friday, it said it would not veto proposals to ban Russia and said it would keep working with its European Union partners in the same way.

As the Finance Minister said on Friday, Germany is excluding Russia from SWIFT. 

Still, it needs to think about the consequences for its economy. Germany has the most trade with Russia in the EU.

Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, said that his country strongly agreed with the idea of keeping Russia out of the system. 

Then, read more. Boris Johnson, the British prime minister, told the leaders of NATO countries on Friday that they should act quickly to get Russia out of SWIFT.

He said a decision on SWIFT could be made in the “coming days.”

Jen Psaki, a spokesperson for the White House, said that removing Russia from SWIFT is still an option. 

However, she also said that President Joe Biden prefers to take steps with his allies.

An unnamed U.S. official said that if the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, fell, more Western sanctions were likely. Western officials now think this will happen in the next few days.