Summary US citizens barred from Russia in Magnitsky tit-for-tat.
MOSCOW, April 13 (Reuters) - Moscow banned 18 U.S. citizens on Saturday from entering Russia in retaliation for a U.S. move to ban 18 Russians from the United States under a new law penalising Russian citizens suspected of taking part in human rights abuses.
Moscow said on Saturday that the United States had dealt a severe blow to mutual trust by listing 18 Russians who would be barred from the United States under a new law.
The law, named after the Russian whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, who died in prison in 2009, has become an irritant in
relations between the former Cold War superpowers.
The Americans barred from Russia under a law adopted in retaliation included members of the administration of former U.S. President George W. Bush whom the Russian Foreign Ministry linked to torture, as well as officials involved in the prosecution of Russians now in U.S. prisons.
