UPDATE 2: US President Trump signs new anti-Russia sanctions

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MOSCOW, Aug 2 (PRIME) -- U.S. President Donald Trump signed a bill introducing additional sanctions against Russia among several other states, a White House official told PRIME on Wednesday.

The White House will soon release a statement on the issue, the official added.

The ruble fell 42 kopecks against the U.S. dollar to 60.77 at 5:37 p.m. Moscow time and decreased 74 kopecks against the euro to 72.01.

Last week both chambers of the U.S. parliament signed a bill, which prohibits companies to invest more than U.S. $1 million in a single payment or more than $5 million during the course of a year in construction of Russian export pipelines, as well as provision of goods, services, technologies and information support for the construction. The U.S. will continue standing against the construction of the Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline.

Anastasia Fyodorova, deputy chairwoman of the information and press department of the Russian Foreign Ministry, told PRIME that adversaries of Russian pipeline project Nord Stream-2 are either pursuing their benefit or trying to harm Russia.

“We are convinced that adversaries of Nord Stream-2 do not care about the energy security of Europe but are pursuing their benefit or are guided by a decision to hurt Russia,” Fyodorova said.

Alexei Chepa, deputy chairman of the committee for foreign relations of the State Duma, the parliament’s lower house, told PRIME that Russia does not need to introduce retaliatory economic sanctions against the U.S.

“We do not need to do this, this is impractical,” Chepa said. “The trade balance between our states is not big. We will win nothing if we stop selling them space engines or if we stop selling them titanium. Yes, we will be harming them for a while but we will harm ourselves as well. We are not going to hurt ourselves.”

Chepa added that Moscow has already responded with a staff cut of the U.S. embassy.

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