CHINA will not join the US and European governments in imposing financial sanctions on Russia, the country’s bank regulator said today as Moscow suffered “a serious blow” to its economy.

It came after the European Union announced the removal of seven Russian banks from the Swift interbank messaging network and said that Russia’s central bank may face efforts to prevent it from accessing £470 billion of foreign reserves.

The list of removed banks includes VTB, Bank Otkritie, Novikombank, Promsvyazbank, Bank Rossiya, Sovcombank, and VEB.