The United States on December 5 imposed fresh sanctions targeting several entities and individuals that the U.S. Treasury Department says are revenue generators for the regime of Belarusian authoritarian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka.
The action aims to increase pressure on the Lukashenka regime for its "brutal suppression of Belarus's democratic civil society, corrupt financial enrichment of the Lukashenka family, and complicity in Russia's unjustified war against Ukraine," the Treasury Department said in a news release.
One of the individuals targeted is Dzmitry Shautsou, secretary-general for the Belarus Red Cross, whom the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) said has been complicit in Russia’s efforts to transport Ukrainian children to Russia.
The Russian government and Belarus's regime "have been working together to coordinate and fund the movement of children from Ukraine to Belarus," the Treasury Department said.
Both Ukraine and the Belarusian democratic opposition have labeled the transfers unlawful deportations, and the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, the Russian commissioner for children's rights, for their roles in the unlawful deportations. Moscow has not denied transferring Ukrainian children to Russia but claims it did so for their own protection.
OFAC said it was designating Shautsou for having assisted Lvova-Belova, who has previously been designated for sanctions, in her efforts to transport Ukrainian children to Russia.
The Belarusian Red Cross reported in June that more than 700 Ukrainian children were in Belarus, and in July, the Belarus Red Cross sparked international outrage when Shautsou visited children in the Luhansk region of Ukraine and said on Belarusian state television that the organization has been actively involved in bringing Ukrainian children from Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine to Belarus.
The International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has called for Shautsou's removal, and the IFRC on December 1 suspended the membership of the Belarus Red Cross.
The Treasury Department announced the sanctions during a visit to Washington by Belarusian Opposition leader Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, telling lawmakers that Belarus accepted about 2,000 children who had been deported from Russian-occupied Ukraine.
Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya testifies during a Subcommittee of the House Foreign Affairs about Belarus on Capitol Hill on December 5.
Undersecretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian E. Nelson said in the news release that the United States will continue to target "actors who facilitate Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine, coordinate the movement of children from Ukraine to Belarus, and support Lukashenka's authoritarian regime."
The sanctions also take aim at what treasury said were the Lukashenka regime's revenue generators and his so-called personal wallets by targeting members of Lukashenka's inner circle, including Alyaksandr Shakutsin, one of the leading businessmen in Belarus who made his fortune through privatization under Lukashenka.
Shakutsin controls a large piece of Belarus's construction machinery production business through his company Amkodor, which is currently planning to produce attack drones and artillery fire systems, the treasury said.
"Despite running a deficit for years, Amkodor has relied on Shakutsin's personal relationship with Lukashenka to secure highly favorable loans and other forms of public support at the expense of the average Belarusian," the department said.
Among the other Belarusian entities designated for sanctions are three state-owned companies that OFAC said have served as "revenue generators" for the regime: the Belarusian Cement Company, Belarusian Production and Trade Concern of Timber Woodworking and Pulp and Paper Industry (Bellesbumprom), and Republican Unitary Enterprise Beltamozhservice (Beltamozhservice).
The designation also names the general director of Beltamozhservice, Vadim Babarikin, and two of Belarus's richest oligarchs, Pavel Topuzidis and Viktor Petrovich, who though their business Tabak Invest control 30 percent of Belarus's tobacco production. The company has been cited in news reports as having been involved in a cigarette-smuggling scheme into Russia that has generated millions of dollars in revenue.
The designation also names companies in the Belarusian defense sector and some of their directors that OFAC said have supported Russia's war in Ukraine.
The sanctions freeze any assets held by the individuals and entities held in U.S. jurisdiction and generally bar Americans from dealing with them.