On March 3, the government decided to freeze the assets of four new banks, including VTB Bank, the second largest bank in Ukraine, as an additional economic sanction against Russia for its invasion of the country. Of the seven large and medium-sized banks that the European Union (EU) has decided to exclude from the international funds settlement network, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT), these four banks were previously excluded from the freeze.

Nihon Keizai Shimbun