Visa says latest U.S. sanctions aren't affecting Russia operations

MOSCOW (Reuters) - International credit and debit card company Visa Inc said on Wednesday that a new wave of U.S. economic sanctions is not affecting its work in Russia and does not force it to stop serving Russian clients. The U.S. Treasury on Tuesday imposed targeted sanctions on Russian banks including VTB, its subsidiary Bank of Moscow and Russian Agricultural Bank. "The new package of U.S. economic sanctions is not influencing the operations of Visa in Russia and does not force Visa to halt or block operations of financial institutions who have fallen under the sanctions," Visa said in a statement. "We are continuing to process transactions in a normal way." Earlier this year, Visa and its competitor MasterCard stopped serving clients of several Russian banks targeted by Western sanctions, prompting Moscow to tighten rules for foreign card companies operating in Russia. (Reporting by Alexander Winning and Oksana Kobzeva; Editing by Lidia Kelly)