OTTAWA — Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says co-ordinated sanctions against Russia by G7 countries will go even further in the coming days, choking off President Vladimir Putin’s ability to fund his war on Ukraine.
Freeland says she spoke with her G7 counterparts this morning, joined by Ukraine’s “tired but determined” finance minister, who assured them his country would win the war as he spoke from a windowless room furnished with a spartan cot and a blue and yellow flag taped to the wall.
She says existing sanctions are the most serious and stringent ever imposed on a major economy and new measures will keep targeting the institutions and individuals enabling Putin to advance his attack.
Freeland says G7 countries understand the stakes of this great conflict between democracy and dictatorship.
She says Putin has made a grave and historic error and this is not the behaviour of a superpower but the last gasp of a failing kleptocracy.
Defence Minister Anita Anand also says Canada will provide another 1,600 fragmentation vests and just under 400,000 meal packs to Ukraine in addition to previously announced military aid.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 1, 2022.