US President Joe Biden intends to announce, on Friday, the severance of trade relations with Russia, in coordination with the Group of Seven and the European Union.

On the other hand, Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed that his country will take measures to confront what he described as the West's economic war.

The White House said that President Biden will announce new measures today as part of efforts to hold Moscow accountable for its war in Ukraine.

And the American "Bloomberg" website stated that Biden will call on Congress to stop normal trade relations with Russia, paving the way for increasing tariffs on Russian imports, as the president cannot change the trade situation of a country on his part, because it is a decision within the powers of Congress.

Leaders in the House and Senate have lobbied for the abolition of preferential trade relations with Moscow.

But earlier this week, that provision was removed from a bill in the House of Representatives banning Russian energy imports.

And if Congress approves a change in trade status with Russia, that action would put it on a list of countries like Cuba and North Korea.

According to International Monetary Fund data, Russia directed a third of its exports to the European Union in 2020, compared to only 5% to the United States.

On Thursday evening, the US President said that his Russian counterpart was betting on the division of NATO, the West and Washington, but his bet did not work.

And he stressed - in a speech he delivered at the winter meeting of members of the Democratic National Committee - that what he called the battle for freedom has a price, and that the Americans are beginning to feel the rise in fuel prices, but they realize the importance of this battle.

Biden pointed out that the Americans know that the cost will be greater, in the absence of action to confront Putin, who he described as a tyrant.

In turn, the US Ambassador to the Security Council, Linda Thomas Greenfield, said that her country will continue to arm the Ukrainian people through NATO.

Greenfield added - in a statement to Al Jazeera - that Washington will continue to work to isolate the Russian regime, as she put it, and put pressure on it to stop the fighting immediately.

On sanctions, the US delegate said that our European allies should work to reduce their dependence on Russian oil to make Western sanctions more effective.


Russian oil exception

In a related context, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said that the European Union will not impose sanctions on Russian gas or oil exports.

He added - in a video clip posted on his Facebook page - that what he called the most important issue was settled in an appropriate manner, and that there would be no sanctions on gas or oil.

Latvia, Poland and Lithuania expressed their support for the European Union's ban on energy imports from Russia, during the informal European summit in the French city of Versailles yesterday.

But Germany and Austria-Hungary opposed the plan, as Russian imports cover a large part of their energy needs.

European Union countries spend about 420 million dollars per day on gas imports from Russia, while the volume of their spending on importing Russian oil reaches 400 million per day.


Russian moves

On the other hand, the Russian President stressed that his country fulfills its commitments related to the export of energy to Europe, including the transit line through Ukrainian territory.

Putin added that his country's economy will adapt to the sanctions, and will find alternatives to imports in all fields, stressing that the sanctions would have been imposed on Moscow in one way or another, as happened previously during the Soviet era.

For its part, the Russian Prosecutor General's Office announced Friday tightening restrictions on foreign companies that decided to leave the country against the background of the invasion of Ukraine.

A group of American and European companies have suspended their operations in Russia in response to the military action against Ukraine.

The Public Prosecutor said in a statement that the Public Prosecution Office will impose strict control over adherence to the labor law, including the terms of employment contracts, procedures for paying salaries, and determining their size.

As part of its efforts to confront the sanctions, Moscow announced a ban and suspension of the export of a number of agricultural and manufactured products to the countries of the Eurasian Union, which includes Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, until August 31.

The decision includes a ban on the export of cars, planes and drones abroad until the end of the year.

Russia has announced that it will pay its European bond obligations in rubles if banks refuse to take delivery of other currencies.

It added that it will only allow payments in foreign currencies, if the currency accounts of the central bank and the government are not frozen.