FILE PHOTO: Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin in Washington, U.S., February 6, 2018. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told lawmakers on Wednesday that sanctions against wealthy Russians in retaliation for Moscow’s meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election would be released shortly.

“We are actively working on those sanctions,” Mnuchin told the Senate Finance Committee during a scheduled budget hearing. “You should expect them in the near future.”

Members of the U.S. Congress passed new sanctions on Russia nearly unanimously last summer and President Donald Trump, who wanted warmer ties with Moscow and had opposed the legislation as it worked its way through Congress, signed it reluctantly in August, six months into his presidency.

As required by the law, the Treasury in late January issued a public list of Russian oligarchs close to the Kremlin who could be sanctioned, as well as a classified annex sent only to Congress.