June 11, 2025 Ukraine and the World – Against russia’s Aggression. Sanctions in Action

“With partners we will ramp up the pressure to force putin to agree to a ceasefire,” UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy commented on the russian air attack against Ukraine on the night of June 10.

“While Ukraine wants to negotiate, putin continues terror. Massive support for Ukraine and pressure on russia thus remain necessary. Otherwise, putin will continue to prefer aggression to negotiation.,” Minister of Defence of the Netherlands Ruben Brekelmans wrote regarding russia’s massive night attack on Ukraine on June 10.

“Last night, russia once again unleashed terror on Ukraine, launching waves of drones and missiles on Kyiv and Odesa. putin and his imperial ambitions remain the greatest obstacle to peace. He doesn’t seek an end to the war – only more deaths and destruction,” said Kęstutis Budrys.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Estonia Margus Tsahkna has called for “crushing sanctions” against russia after the russian army’s night attack on Ukraine.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has confirmed that the political promise of the leaders of the Alliance to accept Ukraine as a member in the future remains in force, even if this position will not be voiced in the final communiqué following the summit on June 24-25 in the Hague.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania Kęstutis Budrys believes that the recent Ukrainian special operation “Pavutyna” shows that russia is not a fortress that cannot be penetrated.

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A lasting ceasefire in Ukraine will allow russia to increase its weapons stockpile, which increases the risks for NATO member states. This was stated by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. He added that russia is building up its military capabilities and within five years it will be ready to use military force against NATO states.

russia intends to test NATO’s resolve, in particular by expanding its confrontation with the West beyond Ukraine, said President of the Federal Intelligence Service of the FRG Bruno Kahl. “We are absolutely sure, and we have intelligence to back it up, that Ukraine is just a step on the way to the West,” the President of the BND said. moscow may carry out a provocation in the Baltic states under the guise of “protecting the russian-speaking population”.

The key proposal in the 18th EU sanctions package against russia will be to lower the price ceiling for russian oil from $60 a barrel to $45, as well as to ban the use of russian energy infrastructure, including the two “nord stream” pipelines.

President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has announced her intention to push for a lower price ceiling for russian oil at the upcoming G7 meeting on June 15-17 in Canada. “We are seriously committed to getting russia to come to the negotiating table with these sanctions, and to take these negotiations seriously to achieve lasting peace. This is a common goal”, von der Leyen said.

Latvia is introducing administrative and criminal liability for violations of international and national sanctions since June 10.

The United States has arrested russian cryptocurrency trader yuri gugnin for circumventing sanctions and laundering $530 million. He helped procure components with export restrictions, in particular for the needs of rosatom, and received USDT from foreign clients, converted them into dollars through controlled accounts and passed them through the American financial system, concealing the purpose and origin of the funds. He faces 22 charges, including sanctions circumvention, fraud, and money laundering. He could be sentenced to 30 years in prison for some of the charges.

A proposal to the United States to resume direct flights with russia has not met with understanding in Washington – said deputy minister of foreign affairs of the rf ryabkov.

German state-owned company Securing Energy for Europe, as part of getting rid of dependence on russian gas, has signed a 10-year natural gas supply contract with Azerbaijan’s state oil and gas company SOCAR, which provides for German investment in production infrastructure.

The inflow of foreign currency to russia has declined sharply: in May, the 29 largest exporters reporting their transactions to the central bank sold only $7.3 billion worth of foreign currency, the lowest since October 2023.

russia has sharply reduced petrol supplies to other countries: exports by sea in May amounted to only 133 thousand tons of fuel. The figure was down by 47 % year-on-year and by 63 % compared to April.

At the end of the first quarter, the balanced loss of russian coal companies reached 79.9 billion rubles. On average, the coal industry was losing money at the rate of 26 billion rubles a month, or 900 million rubles a day. 62 % of the companies became unprofitable, having gone into the red by 126.3 billion rubles within three months.

Expensive loans, higher taxes, decline in harvests and a shortage of imported seeds have led to a sharp decrease in production of three basic food products in russia. In January-April 2025, russian production of sugar decreased by 32.3 % year-on-year, of sunflower oil – by 15.5 %, and of flour – by 7.8 %. In April alone, russian factories produced by 35 thousand tons less sugar than a year earlier (-36.1 %), by 108 thousand tons less oil (-15.6 %) and by 72 thousand tons less wheat and wheat-rye flour (-9.1 %).

The liquid assets of the national wealth fund may be completely exhausted in 2026 if oil prices remain low. This is the forecast made by economists from ranhigs and the gaidar institute in their report on the implementation of the federal budget for 2025.

Since the end of 2021, prices for main models of “avtovaz” have increased by an average of 72 %, and for Chinese brands that were then sold in russia, on average, the prices have doubled. This is exactly twice as much as the inflation rate accumulated during this time, which was 36 %.

At the end of 2024, pawnshops in russia issued RUB 302 billion in loans to the population, which is by a quarter more than in 2023 (RUB 239 billion). The total profit of pawnshops increased by 73 % to RUB 8.8 billion.

In May 2025, the cost of construction of warehouse real estate in the rf reached RUB 67.8 thousand for 1 sq. m, which is by 20 % more than a year earlier.

During the two months of the new regulations banning the migrant children’ admission to russian schools without a russian language test, only 4 % of those who applied were accepted.

Orthodox oligarch malofeev has called for replacing migrants with robots: “a russian robot painted in gzhel is much better than a live protein migrant”.

Childless young couples should be restricted from accessing the Internet at night so that they could make their families larger instead of using gadgets, – said ivanov, a member of the Bryansk regional duma and leader of the “orthodox russia” movement. In his opinion, the optimal period of turning off the Internet would be from 23:00 to 02:00. He called it “digital moderation”.

The Ministers of Transport of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Germany, Slovakia, Finland, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Denmark and Romania call on  the EU to take all possible political, diplomatic and legal measures to increase international pressure on the regimes of russia and the rb over their interference with the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) in the EU.

In the 18th package of sanctions against russia, the European Commission has also prepared measures against the rb. The EC’s proposals include a complete ban on transactions with belarusian banking institutions. Previously, it applied only to Swift. The package also includes four belarusian companies operating in the military industrial complex. It is planned to impose personal sanctions against them. The package also provides for a ban on the import of weapons from the rb. Besides, it is proposed to expand the list of sanctioned goods and technologies that will be banned from being supplied to belarus. These include chemicals, certain types of metals and plastics. New restrictions may also affect the transit of goods through the rb.

Annual inflation in belarus accelerated to 7.1 % in May. Food prices rose most noticeably – by 9.6 %.

The kgb of the rb has added 1.3 thousand people to the list of “terrorists”. More than 600 people on the “terrorist” list are people from the Interpol database (most of them because of their links to al-Qaeda and ISIS), plus as many belarusians, who usually have empty lines or numbers of “political” articles of the criminal code instead of a reason.

On belarusian railways, all employees, without exception, are asked to sign a written confirmation of familiarization with the list of criminal articles for illegal activities, including “extremist” materials on the Internet.

lukashenko’s attempts to present his latest visit to China as the “event of the century” are at odds with the publications in the Chinese media, where the main narrative was that Beijing could save the technologically backward country in Europe.

The national opera and ballet theater of belarus plans to tour the temporarily occupied Crimea in August 2025. The staff is mostly against the trip, but the theater is putting pressure on the singers and ballet dancers, hinting at problems in their future careers. However, many people have written refusals, in particular, in the orchestra. The theater’s management is gathering musicians from other groups.