US Begins Discussing New Sanctions Bill for Russia-Iran

ILLUSTRATION UNSPLASH/Samuel Schroth

JAKARTA - The United States Senate approved a motion to continue discussing the next stage of the bill (RUU) on the imposition of additional sanctions against Russia and Iran.

The deal was made in a second procedural vote and received more than 50 percent of the votes of the senators present in the US Congress' upper house.

As reported by ANTARA from Sputnik, Thursday, July 30, based on the results of the vote count, the bill obtained the required number of votes (more than 50) to proceed to the official discussion stage in the Senate, where senators can propose amendments.

After that process, the US Senate then held another procedural vote, which required a threshold of 60 votes to apply cloture, a formal parliamentary procedure to end debate and force a vote, which only requires a simple majority to be approved.

If approved by the Senate, the bill on additional sanctions will be sent to the US House of Representatives for discussion.

The vote was the second procedural stage related to the bill in less than 24 hours. Previously, Tuesday (28/7), the Senate voted to end the debate on a motion to continue to the discussion stage of the bill.

The bill on the imposition of sanctions released in early July, according to RIA Novosti's review and quotes, regulates the proposed reduction of tariffs on the five largest buyers of Russian oil and gas from 500 percent to 100 percent.

At the same time, the bill will establish an import tariff of 500 percent for all goods imported into the US from Russia. The document will also propose sanctions against the Russian Central Bank, Sberbank, VTB, and Gazprombank.

On Tuesday (14/7), US President Donald Trump said his administration was reviewing the bill, which he said had a good chance of being passed by the US Congress. Trump said the decision was made in honor of the late Senator Lindsey Graham.