Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that Russia favored to conduct bilateral trade with all countries in their national currencies, rather than the dollar, but the idea needed to be reviewed meticulously before implementation.

"The subject of using national currencies in bilateral trade operation is a subject that Russia has continuously brought up for a rather long while on various levels including the highest one,” Peskov said.

“President (Vladimir) Putin has spoken about such a possibility on several occasions, moreover about the relevance of such move. Of course, this requires detailed work, detailed calculations, but this is what we strive for in our bilateral trade relations and it has been brought up multiple times at Russian-Turkish negotiations,” he added.

Peskov made the remarks two days after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara was preparing to conduct trade through national currencies with China, Russia and Ukraine.

Last week, the US Department of State announced a new round of sanctions against Russia for a nerve agent attack against former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the UK.

Washington and London have repeatedly accused Moscow of orchestrating the attack using the Russian nerve agent Novichok in Salisbury, England, on March 14.

The Kremlin has vehemently and repeatedly rejected any involvement, saying the substance could have originated from the countries studying Novichok, including the UK itself, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Sweden.

The new US sanctions target export licenses of sensitive US technologies and industrial equipment, such as electronics, calibration equipment, and gas turbine engines and will enter into force on August 22.

The US has already introduced several rounds of sanctions against Russia for what it calls Moscow’s meddling in the 2016 US presidential election and its alleged involvement in the Ukraine conflict. Russia has rejected both allegations.

KD