FIVE Russian banks and three 'high net worth individuals' have been slapped with sanctions after Putin sent troops into Ukraine. 

Boris Johnson announced the action the UK Government was taking against Russia after the unprecedented move from the Kremlin overnight. 

He told MPs: "Now the UK and our allies will begin to impose the sanctions on Russia that we have already prepared, using the new and unprecedented powers granted by this House to sanction Russian individuals and entities of strategic importance to the Kremlin."

He confirmed sanctions against five banks - Rossiya, IS Bank, General Bank, promsvyazbank and the Black Sea Bank - as well as against three wealthy oligarchs; billionaire oil trader Gennady Timchenko, construction magnate and Putin's judo sparring partner Boris Rotenberg, and his brother Igor Rotenberg.

The Prime Minister continued: "Any assets they hold in the UK will be frozen, the individuals concerned will be banned from travelling here, and we will prohibit all UK individuals and entities from having any dealings with them.

"This is the first tranche, the first barrage, of what we are prepared to do: we will hold further sanctions at readiness, to be deployed alongside the United States and the European Union if the situation escalates still further."

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer called for Russian broadcaster RT to be banned from 'spreading its propaganda' in the UK, and urged the government to go further.

He said Russia should be removed from the international SWIFT banking system, and explained: " I understand the tactic of holding back further sanctions on Putin and his cronies to try and deter an invasion of the rest of Ukraine. 

"But a threshold has already been breached - a sovereign nation has been invaded in a war of aggression based on lies and fabrications.

"If we do not respond with a full set of sanctions now, Putin will once again take away the message that the benefits of aggression outweigh the costs."

Sir Keir continued: "Russia should be excluded from financial mechanisms like Swift and we should ban trading in Russian sovereign debt.

"Putin’s campaign of misinformation should be tackled, Russia Today should be prevented from broadcasting its propaganda around the world."

Ian Blackford, the SNP Westminster leader, said: "Europe stands on the brink of war as a consequence of Russian aggression. It is a day that communities across Scotland, right across these islands and indeed across Europe, desperately hoped would never come to pass." 

He also mirrored the Labour leader's calls for Russia to be banned from SWIFT, and said Ukraine must be provided with suupport including humanitarian support if necessary.

Liam Fox, senior Tory MP and former Defence Secretary, warned that "sanctions can only achieve so much when dealing with an undemocratic state, and someone like Putin."

He added: "What we're witnessing is the real-time cannibalisation of a European democratic state, bite by bite." 

Ian Duncan-Smith also called for the UK Government to go further in its sanctions regime, saying: "Should it not be that we need to hit them hard and hit them now.

"They need to feel the pain of the first part of this decision.

"What is the ultimatum? If they move further, what further action will we take?" 

The Prime Minister responded: "We are hitting them hard now, and we will hit them harder in the future. with each day they continue to violate the sovereignty of Ukraine we will continue to punish Russia."