The U.S. Department of the Treasury on Thursday announced the expansion of the sanctions lists over Ukraine and Crimea by adding three individuals and nine legal entities to them.

"The U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today imposed additional sanctions in response to Russia's continuing malign activity and destabilizing behavior by designating three individuals and nine entities under Ukraine-related authorities," it said in an official statement on November 8.

These designations include two citizens of Ukraine Oleksandr Basov and Andriy Sushko, as well as citizen of Russia Vladimir Zaritsky.

The sanctioned legal entities include: the "Ministry of State Security" of the so-called "Luhansk People's Republic" ("LPR"), AO KrymTETS (a private joint stock company engaged in the operation of electric power generation facilities and transmission systems in Russian-annexed Crimea), three hotel complexes located in Russian-occupied Yalta, namely AY-Petri, Dyulber, and Miskhor; Mriya Resort & SPA (a five-star luxury hotel in Yalta), Limited Liability Company Southern Project (LLC Yuzhny Proekt), Limited Liability Company Infrastructure Projects Management Company (LLC UKIP), and LLC Garant-SV.

The structure of KrymTETS (JSC Krymteploelektrotsentral, Simferopol) includes Simferopol-based combined heat and power plant (CHPP) and Kerch-based Kamysh-Burunskaya CHPP, Saky thermal networks, and Saky PGU-CHPP, which is under construction.

According to the SPARK-Interfax system, JSC KrymTETS is controlled by LLC South Energy Company (Moscow) and the "Ministry of Property of Crimea."

LLC Southern Project is a structure of the Rossiya Bank. Late last year, the Southern Project acquired a 100% stake in Crimean-based State Enterprise of Sparkling Wine Novy Svet (Novy Svet), which is also under sanctions, for 1.5 billion Russian rubles. The Rossiya Bank itself, as well as its largest shareholder, Yury Kovalchuk, have long been under U.S. sanctions.

The introduction of these sanctions was announced by U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations Kurt Volker at a telephone briefing earlier on Thursday, November 8.

According to him, these sanctions concern three individuals and nine legal entities that support Russia's attempts to integrate the Crimean region of Ukraine through private investment and private projects, or those involved in serious violations.