These regulations, which come into force on 17 May 2022, amend the Russia Sanctions Regulations 2022 (the principal regulations).

All the amendments fulfil the purpose of the principal regulations, which is to give effect to the Russia Sanctions Act 2022 by imposing sanctions in response to Russia’s military actions in relation to Ukraine (and in response to any assistance from any other country or person).

Additional entities and individuals are added to the sanctions regime, in particular so that the principal regulations apply to named Belarusian political and military individuals and entities on the basis that they are enabling Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (see regulations 4 and 5).

Further sanctions are applied to individuals who are already subject to the travel ban in regulation 7 of the principal regulations. Thus the individuals are already included in Part 2 of Schedule 2 of the principal regulations. Regulation 5(2) of these regulations extends to those individuals the full range of sanctions in the principal regulations (regulations 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, and 11).

These regulations also amend section 31(3) of the Russia Sanctions Act 2022 to include the Fisheries Act 1996 and the KiwiSaver Act 2006 as Acts in relation to which information supplied or obtained under other enactments may be used and disclosed for the purposes of the Russia Sanctions Act 2022.

Schedule 3 of the principal regulations, which relates to prohibited exports, is amended by regulation 6 of these regulations to revoke the item relating to the Harmonised System (HS) Code 8903.92, because that code has been replaced already in Schedule 3 by HS Codes 8903.31, 8903.32, and 8903.33.