U.K. bans luxury goods exports to Russia over war in Ukraine

The U.K. government announced a ban on exporting luxury goods to Russia and imposed new tariffs on Russian imports, its latest wave of sanctions over the invasion of Ukraine.

Products including vodka, fertilizers, steel and aluminum will face an import tariff increase of 35 percentage points, Britain’s Department for International Trade said in a joint statement with the Treasury on Tuesday. The value of the goods targeted is 900 million pounds ($1.2 billion), it said.

“Our new tariffs will further isolate the Russian economy from global trade,” Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak said. “These tariffs build on the U.K.’s existing work to starve Russia’s access to international finance, sanction Putin’s cronies and exert maximum economic pressure on his regime.”

The European Union is also set to impose a similar ban, and the U.K. is due to announce sanctions on more Russian individuals and entities later Tuesday.

Britain has already sanctioned a series of high-profile Russian tycoons, including Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich, in response to the war in Ukraine, and is phasing out Russian oil imports. The U.K. has also fast-tracked legislation to allow it to swiftly impose sanctions on individuals already targeted by the U.S. and EU.

The luxury goods affected by the U.K. move will likely include high-end fashion, vehicles and works of art, and the export ban will come in “shortly,” the Trade Department said in the statement.