Mar 3, 2022: According to a report by Reuters, Japan will freeze the assets of four additional Russian banks, Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki said on Thursday, taking to seven the total number to be slapped with such sanctions by Tokyo.

“Japan will firmly implement (the sanctions) together with other members of G7,” Suzuki told press.

The finance ministry said in a statement that Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s cabinet had approved the decision to freeze the assets of VTB Bank, Sovcombank, Novikombank and Otkritie. The freezing of bank assets, all of which are closely linked to the Russian government, will take effect on April 2, a ministry official said.

Dozens of people, including Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko, have been targeted for freezing assets.

The decision comes after the government announced on Tuesday that it would freeze the assets of Russia’s state-owned Promsvyazbank and Vnesheconombank, as well as the country’s central bank.

Japanese officials told reporters that sanctions on Tokyo’s banking sector would be completed with the addition of four banks, which the European Union has decided to exclude from Swift’s international settlement network.

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