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Washington (AFP) – The United States on Thursday imposed sanctions on a Chinese company for allegedly providing satellite imagery in Ukraine to help the Russian Wagner paramilitary group.
The Treasury Department and the State Department announced a series of actions following a move by the White House last week to formally designate the Wagner group a “transnational criminal organization.”
The new sanctions “will further hamper the Kremlin’s ability to arm its war machine which is engaged in a war of aggression against Ukraine and which has caused disproportionate death and destruction,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.
Targeted firms include Changsha Tianyi Space Science and Technology Research Institute Co., a Chinese company the Treasury Department says provided satellite imagery over Ukraine to the Wagner group.
“These images were collected to enable Wagner’s combat operations in Ukraine,” said a statement from the Treasury Department, which also announced sanctions on a subsidiary of the Luxembourg-based Chinese company.
China is officially an ally of Russia, but the United States has announced what it sees as lukewarm support from Beijing for the war in Ukraine, including a refusal to supply arms to Moscow.
The Treasury Department also imposed sanctions on a United Arab Emirates-based aviation company, Kratol, which said it had provided planes for the Wagner group to fly personnel and equipment between the Central African Republic, Libya and Mali.
Headed by Yevgeny Prigojine, a businessman close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, this paramilitary organization has assumed an increasingly prominent role in Ukraine, sending Russian prisoners to battlefields who are promised clemency.
The White House said Friday that Wagner has about 50,000 fighters in Ukraine, 80% of them from prisons.