Russian expert: Sanctions against Russia to have stressful impact on CIS countries

Economic sanctions against Russia will not have such a significant impact on the CIS countries, given that they are directed specifically against the Russian Federation. The effect on other countries will be indirect due to the relatively strong interconnectedness of economic systems. In particular, such countries as Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan are integrated into the Russian economic space, Alexander Karavaev, a researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Report's Russian bureau.

Karavaev spoke about the main economic sectors that suffered after the sanctions imposed by the West.

"The main shocks were for exchange rates. This will affect not only trade but also government contracts, so we will have to recalculate for new exchange rates," the expert noted.

According to the economist, there will be a slowdown in cargo flows in the post-Soviet space: "Long-term contracts will suffer, which will affect cargo flows. There will be a slowdown in cargo flows in the post-Soviet space as a whole. The population already feels the immediate impact through the exchange rate, and this directly affects the remittances of migrants, so the volume of remittances will decrease."

Karavaev suggested that Russia could expect a depreciation of the dollar.

He said the dollar will depreciate by a maximum of 10%."

The expert also stressed that the impact of the sanctions would be felt within a month, as it takes time to calculate the losses because Russia does not know how its gold and foreign exchange reserves will suffer.