According to Russia's largest news agency ItAR-Tass, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Monday that the country will launch a new payment system in which there will be no restrictions on digital currencies used for international payments.

"We are introducing an alternative payment system that gives modern technology (digital financial assets, digital currencies)," the finance minister said.

He also explained: "Digital currencies can be used for cross-border payments. It's still early days, but there will be digital rubles, digital yuan and other similar currencies in the future."

"It's a payment system without any restrictions. The recipient and the payer agree and settle the payments, and no other country can step in and freeze those payments." Siluanov stressed.

The United States and other Western countries have imposed economic sanctions on Russia since the war, and Russia wants to try to reduce its dependence on the dollar. The United States and those Western countries seized more than $300 billion in Russian central bank foreign exchange assets frozen under sanctions.

Russian banks have been exploring ways to create digital rubles as a way to move away from the US dollar. According to a July 2021 report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service, the Russian government accelerated its de-dollarization in 2014, noting that the introduction of the digital ruble "would further reduce Russia's dependence on Western countries and [dollar-centric] payments infrastructure."

In addition, Siluanov revealed that the Russian ruble and the Chinese yuan have replaced the US dollar in settlement in the two countries. "Looking at the structure of trade between Russia and China, already more than 70 percent of the settlement is in our currency."