Moscow accused the US of ‘medieval torture’ in statement barring five Americans from entry as retaliation for US blacklisting of four Russians and a Ukrainian

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Russia has placed five Americans on a blacklist for alleged rights abuses, shortly after Washington added five persons to its sanctions list, accusing the United States of “medieval torture”.

In a response to the Monday blacklisting of four Russians and a Ukrainian under the Magnitsky Act, named after a Russian lawyer, Moscow banned entry to five former US officials, including former prosecutor general Alberto Gonzales, the foreign ministry said.

“We must remind that it was the United States that officially legalised and actively used medieval torture in the beginning of the 21st century,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.

Besides Gonzales, it blacklisted former US undersecretary of defense Douglas Feith, CIA lawyer John Rizzo, former assistant attorney general Jay Scott Bybee and former general counsel of the department of defense William James Haynes II.

They would be barred from entering Russia “as a response to Washington’s anti-Russian policy,” the ministry said.

It also pointed out “current American problems like police violence with racial undertones and a penitentiary system that is far from perfect, something Washington should address first”.

Sergei Magnitsky was arrested after pointing out a fraud scam perpetrated by high-placed officials, and died in a Moscow jail in 2009, unleashing an international scandal.

Moscow, however, denied that his arrest and death was a corruption cover-up and on Tuesday once again accused Washington of “hypocrisy”, advising that it should solve its own problems before accusing Russia.