Sanctions impact Russian emigres in Israel needing pensions
Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman tries helping older Israeli citizens who immigrated from Russia and depend on their modest Russian pension.
Israeli Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman has failed in his efforts to soften restrictions on transferring the money of Israelis from banks in Russia to Israel. At a high-level meeting of several directors of big Israeli banks, supervisors of banks at the Bank of Israel and Finance Ministry representatives, it was decided that acceding to Liberman’s request could appear like Israel is circumventing international sanctions on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.
The disagreement on this issue stems from the fact that there is no Israeli position paper that prohibits or allows the transfer of funds except for general adherence to international sanctions. What Liberman asked was to examine the treatment of money in financial institutions that are not under sanctions.
