Members of the Federation Council proposed on Wednesday to add US Secretary of State John Kerry and his deputies to the sanctions list and ban them from entering Russia in response to the issuance of a truncated visa to Valentina Matvienko to travel to the US for a session of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, RIA Novosti reported .

A member of the international committee of the Federation Council, Igor Morozov, called for an asymmetric response to Washington. “Russia should expand its sanctions list to include the persons who made the decision to grant a visa to the Speaker of the Federation Council, which runs counter to the foundations of international law—Secretary of State John Kerry and his deputies,” the senator said.

In his opinion, Washington abused its right to host, since in this case the United States is the same member of the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly as the other guests and does not have the right to decide how much representatives of national delegations can work at the session.

On Wednesday, August 26, the Russian Foreign Ministry admitted that the visit of the delegation of Russian legislators headed by Matvienko to New York had become impossible. A statement from the Foreign Ministry explains that the visa issued by Washington after long delays contains a number of unacceptable restrictions on Matvienko’s stay in the United States. In particular, she is not allowed to participate in any meetings or other events of the Inter-Parliamentary Union.

The Foreign Ministry believes that such “completely unacceptable” actions by the United States “represent a gross violation of generally accepted norms of international law and run counter to the obligations of states hosting multilateral forums on their territory.”

The session of the Geneva-based union will take place in New York at the UN headquarters. The Russian delegation, led by the head of the upper chamber of parliament, planned to take part in the events of the union from August 31 to September 2.

On August 24, a RIA Novosti source reported that Matvienko’s trip to the United States to participate in a session of the Inter-Parliamentary Union would be cancelled. Later, a spokesman for the US Embassy in Moscow, William Stevens , said that the visa application was still under review. On August 25, the American Embassy informed the Russian Foreign Ministry that an American visa for Speaker Matvienko would be ready on August 26.

The Federation Council proposed banning Kerry from entering Russia