Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Russia has a base for creating an analogue of the SWIFT payment system, RIA Novosti reports.
“And I am convinced that both the government and the Central Bank must do everything to ensure that this base is reliable and guarantees complete independence and a guarantee against damage that someone may try to inflict on us in addition”, – Lavrov said.
Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry said that the Russian Federation does not exclude the formation of an alternative SWIFT system on a new technological basis. Also, Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Pankin stressed that this is not only a reaction “to the current geopolitical reality, but also a response to the need to modernize payment methods, taking into account modern advanced achievements in the digital sphere”.
SWIFT is an international interbank system for data exchange and payments, to which more than 11 thousand of the largest organizations in almost all countries are connected. The media regularly publish information that Russia may be disconnected from the system as one of the tough Western sanctions measures.