House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in a phone call earlier this week that if the State Department doesn’t designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism, Congress will, according to a Politico report citing two sources who they know the conversation. The State Department and Pelosi’s office did not immediately respond to Insider’s requests for comment. The secretary of state has the authority to designate countries as state sponsors of terror, a label that requires the US government to impose a range of sanctions. Currently, four countries have been designated as such: Cuba, North Korea, Iran and Syria. Overall, the four main categories of sanctions resulting from these authorities’ determinations include restrictions on US foreign aid, a ban on defense exports and sales, certain controls on the export of dual-use items, and various financial and other restrictions. State Department website. “Designation under the aforementioned authorities also entails other sanctions laws that punish persons and countries involved in certain transactions with state sponsors.” The Ukrainian government, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, urged the Biden administration to designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle in Washington, DC, have also expressed support for such a move. The Russian military has repeatedly attacked civilians in Ukraine and thousands of civilians have been killed so far. Russia has been widely accused of war crimes. Moscow is already facing unprecedented sanctions that have increasingly isolated its economy as a result of its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters in April that the Biden administration is taking a closer look at whether to designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. “The sanctions that we have imposed and received are the same steps that would be taken to designate a state sponsor of terrorism,” Price said at the time. Along these lines, some legal experts argue that labeling Russia a state sponsor of terror would be redundant. Ingrid Wuerth, an international law and foreign affairs expert at Vanderbilt University, said in a recent blog for Just Security that Blinken should not designate Russia as a sponsor of terrorism — adding that Congress “should not seek to pressure him the hand”. Wuerth pointed out that the US has already imposed “crippling sanctions” on Moscow that have forced Russia to default on its sovereign debt. For that reason, Wuerth said the consequences of the designation related to sanctions would not be particularly significant. “Probably the most important effect of designating Russia would be to allow it to be prosecuted for acts of terrorism that have harmed US citizens. In light of the ongoing war in Ukraine, the many people affected by it, and the limited resources available to repair that damage, such litigation is premature to say the least and may never be a good way to punish Russia or compensate the victims,” Wuerth said.
