Russia has announced bans on the wife and daughter of US President Joe Biden in response to Washington's widening sanctions against Moscow.
Russia's foreign ministry said on Tuesday that 25 names were being added to the country's “stop list” including Biden's wife Jill and daughter Ashley.
The list also included four US senators comprising the so-called McFaul-Yermak group, who were “responsible for the formation of the [US] Russophobic course of senators," namely, the Republicans Mitch McConnell, Susan Collins and Ben Sasse, and Democrat Kirstin Gillibrand.
Joe Biden, himself, his son, Hunter, Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, CIA chief William Burns, actor Morgan Freeman and a number of US congressmen and journalists had been blacklisted earlier.
Meanwhile, in the wake of the war in Ukraine, the United States has been slapping a slew of unprecedented sanctions on Russia.
In this regard, the Treasury Department said on its website on Tuesday that the newest round of US sanctions was targeting the import of Russian gold as well as the Russian state-owned defense conglomerate Rostec and multiple banks, including the Bank of Moscow.
The US' European NATO allies have followed suit and imposed their own sanctions against Russia over the conflict in Ukraine.
The supply of heavy weaponry to Kiev by the US and its NATO allies has exacerbated matters, further increasing tensions between Moscow and Washington.
Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a special military operation in Ukraine in late February to stop NATO expansion behind Russian borders.
Back then Putin said one of the goals of the special military operation was to “de-Nazify” Ukraine.