WASHINGTON (AP) – The Trump administration announced Thursday that it is imposing sanctions on 19 Russians for alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. election, including 13 indicted by special counsel Robert Mueller.
The penalties also include the first use of new powers that Congress passed last year to punish Moscow for election meddling. Those targets include officials working for the Russian military intelligence agency, GRU.
The Treasury Department said the GRU and Russia’s military both interfered in the American election and were “directly responsible” for the NotPetya cyberattack that hit businesses across Europe in June 2017.
Those included in the Mueller indictment include Yevgeny Prigozhin, who’s become known as the chef to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The administration is also targeting the Internet Research Agency that Mueller said orchestrated much of the cybermeddling in the presidential election.
The White House has also accused Russia of a new and ongoing operation to penetrate the U.S. energy grid.
U.S. national security officials said the FBI, the Homeland Security Department and intelligence agencies have determined that Russian intelligence and others are behind attacks on the American energy sector and that the targets were chosen deliberately.
The officials said the Russians obtained access to the energy system and “conducted network reconnaissance” of industrial control systems that run U.S. factories and the electricity grid. The officials said they’ve helped companies kick the Russians out of all systems currently known to have been penetrated.
The U.S. is sending an alert to energy companies to raise threat awareness.
The Russian government said it’s preparing to retaliate against the sanctions.
Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said the Kremlin is responding calmly to the new sanctions and – in his words – “taking this in our stride.” But he said Russia has “begun preparing retaliatory measures.”
Ryabkov suggests the Trump administration timed the sanctions to come ahead of this weekend’s presidential election in Russia.
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