“An announcement could be made this week,” according to the Washington Post, while CNN expects a “Thursday announcement”. According to both media, the sanctions could be diplomatic and financial. They should also include a secrecy component of computer counter-attack.
Barack Obama has promised retaliation against Russia after the hacking that disrupted the electoral match between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.
Washington has accused Russian hackers of stolen tens of thousands of emails from Democratic officials.
These messages were then put on line, throwing a crude light on the internal deliberations of the Democratic camp and blurring the message of his candidate.
President Obama has directly questioned his Russian counterpart in the affair, stressing that “nothing much happens in Russia without the approval of Vladimir Putin.”
Donald Trump, the president-elect, said he did not “believe” the accusations, described by Moscow as “indecent”.
But he is isolated in his own camp, with most Republican leaders not questioning the reality of Russian operations and calling for sanctions after Russian piracy attacks.
The president of the Senate Armed Services Committee, John McCain, said on Wednesday that “it was necessary for Vladimir Putin to know that such operations will be sanctioned in the future.”
The facts are “extremely serious”, he said on the Fox News channel. “We must sanction the Russian energy sector and impose financial sanctions and restrictions on the travel of senior Russian officials,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, another falcon interviewed by Fox News with Mr. McCain.
But it will be up to the future Trump administration and the new Congress to apply these sanctions, not to the Obama administration, “he added.
Many observers considered that the purpose of the Russian interference was above all to undermine confidence in the legitimacy of the US election, to weaken the future presidency.
A CIA report that leaked into the press went even further, stating that Moscow had conducted these operations in order to win over Donald Trump, who often praised the leadership qualities of Vladimir Putin.