April 7, 2023 Ukraine and the World – Against russia’s Aggression. Sanctions in Action

Poland and Ukraine have agreed on a new military assistance package that will include armored personnel carriers, Rak self-propelled mortars, air defense systems, including Piorun MANPADS, MiG29 fighter jets and other weapons.

SC UkrOboronProm together with Polish company Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa will produce shells of 125 mm caliber for tanks.

Poland and Ukraine signed memoranda of cooperation in the restoration of Ukraine.

Minister of Defence of Lithuania Arvydas Anušauskas pointed out that the cost of the new Lithuanian package of military support for Ukraine will reach about 41 million euros.

Lithuania’s Parliament unanimously approved a resolution containing a point about the need to formally invite Ukraine to join NATO at the Alliance's July summit in Vilnius.

49 countries of the world and the European Union issued a joint statement condemning the illegal deportation of Ukrainian children to russia in response to an informal meeting of the UN Security Council, which russia chairs. The signatory countries stressed that no amount of disinformation spread by russia can deny the veracity of this issue or protect people from responsibility for these crimes.

Ukraine will receive a $2.5 billion grant from the World Bank Trust Fund. This is the fourth additional funding under the project The Public Expenditures For Administrative Capacity Endurance (PEACE in Ukraine)”. The attracted grant funds will be used to ensure the efficiency of the system of state bodies, education, health care and first responders, as well as to ensure pension payments and certain programs of state social assistance. This is the United States’ second grant from the planned for 2023 for a total of $ 9.9 billion.

On April 5, Ukrainian and Polish railway workers began joint testing of the Lublin-Rava-Ruska railway route with 1,435 mm euro-gauge.

As of April 1, there were more than 325,000 refugees from Ukraine in the Czech Republic.

The Stuttgart Staatsgalerie Museum has updated information about the representative of the Ukrainian avant-garde, artist Oleksandra Ekster. Previously, she was signed as a “russian artist”.

Thanks to the cooperation of the US FBI and the Estonian Internal Security Service, a russian citizen of Estonia, who helped russia obtain important American-made electronics, was detained in the country.

“From 00:00 of April 8, 2023, access to the sea and river ports of Bulgaria is prohibited for all vessels that have a certificate of the russian maritime register of shipping, regardless of the flag under which they sail”, the Bulgarian Maritime Administration said in a statement.

New Zealand’s government has imposed additional sanctions against russia and belarus: the new list includes 27 people and five organizations, including the commissioner for children's rights maria lvova- belova and the first deputy commander of the north-caucasus district of the russian guard alibek delimkhanov.

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The Commission for the Protection of Competition of Bulgaria has fined the structures of the russian oil company lukoil more than € 87 million for abuse in the fuel market.

The American company Cisco Systems has destroyed all the equipment, goods and office furniture worth 3 billion rubles which it had in russia. In the spring of 2022, Cisco stopped its activities in the rf, and then announced that it had decided to completely leave the country. The decision was made against the background of the fact that decree of the government of the rf No. 311 of March 9, 2022 prohibits the export from russia of almost all goods, even irons and washing machines. Cisco had been supplying routers, switches and equipment for IP-telephony, occupying half of the russian market for this equipment.

Information that Shell can convert and withdraw abroad more than $ 1 billion in ruble proceeds from the sale of the project in the far east caused a fall of the ruble to a record low for the year. Shell's deal amount is one-fifth of the daily trading volume in russian currency before the start of a full-scale war.

According to the russian high school of economics, more than 44 % of manufacturing companies in the rf could not overcome the problem of critical import dependence. More than 30% of companies have not taken any measures to adapt to international sanctions: such enterprises are outside the world market, passive in terms of exports and lagging behind the technological process.

25 % of manufacturing companies of the rf have no analogues of foreign equipment made either in russia or in conditionally “friendly” countries. 70% of enterprises continue to use foreign equipment and various products due to their higher quality and manufacturability.

russia ranks first in the number of unfulfilled decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. In 2022, 413 positive decisions were made in favor of russians against russia, which is an absolute record over the past ten years and one and a half times higher than in 2021 (267 cases). The amount of compensation awarded has increased almost eight times – from € 11.9 million to € 80.2 million. As of January 1, 2023, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe controls 2,352 russian cases under ECHR decisions (62 of which relate to systemic problems), which is almost 40% of the total number of non-executed decisions.

In March, russian urals oil was sold at $ 47,85 per barrel, while the budget policy of the rf in 2023 provided for $ 70,1. In April, russia must introduce a $ 34 discount from the cost of a better grade Brent, in the next three consecutive months the discount will increase by $ 3, to $ 25 per barrel (in March, the discount on urals to the price of Brent was, according to various estimates, $ 30-31 per barrel).

The Alltech Group refused to develop a land plot in sakhalin region, the license for which was owned by Pacific Oil Resources (100% of the assets of the Cypriot company Elranio Holdings Ltd). In January, it began the process of liquidating business in the rf. The reason is “economic inexpediency” due to the russian crisis.

French canned food manufacturer Bonduelle has informed the rusbrand association that it is suspending its membership and will stop paying contributions from 2024. Such a decision may indicate the company's intention to fully stop its activities in the rf. Last year, the company moved its main office from russia to Kazakhstan.

russia's second-highest status bank vtb suffered 756.8 billion rubles in net losses in 2022 (in 2021, its income amounted to 186.3 billion rubles).

According to the results of 2022, alfa-bank suffered a net loss of 117.1 billion rubles compared to136.6 billion rubles profit a year earlier. The last time the bank had losses was 14 years ago.

The volume of trading in foreign securities at the russian st. petersburg exchange has fallen to a minimum since October last year. This is associated with the active investors’ leaving against the background of leading brokers being on the list of international sanctions. The trading volume was only $ 2.65 billion, which is 1.8 times lower than in February this year ($ 4.69 billion).

In 2022, russia's pension fund was 70% filled from the state budget, its expenditures increased by 12% of the plan to 11.37 trillion rubles.

In March, sales of new cars in russia decreased by 10.6%, mostly products of AvtoVAZ were sold. According to the results of the first quarter, sales fell by 44.7% to 153.5 thousand cars.

Because of the war with Ukraine, the cost of issuing military tickets in moscow has doubled. Now,  one can avoid the army for half a million rubles. By 2022, the doctors’ commission and the “military” category cost up to 250 thousand rubles. Avoiding the army through military commissariats costs up to 6 thousand euros and, according to intermediaries, “the commissariats accept only this currency as payment”. For 3 million rubles, one can buy a military ID about the allegedly completed service. moscow military commissariats agreed to circumvent mobilization for 1.5 million rubles. The procedure for obtaining has become more complicated: for half a million now they do not issue a military ID, but give a delay from service for six months.

The international IT company Kyriba, which has representative offices in 11 countries, is leaving belarus, having worked for about five years. Its belarusian legal entity kyriba engineering llc has been in the process of liquidation since the end of 2022. Kyriba is an American company with French roots, engaged in cloud solutions for financial management and risk management, it is considered to be one of the world leaders in its field. Its clients include Amazon, Uber, Tesla, Auchan, Hermes, BBC Worldwide, Europcar, Hilton.

Over the past month, gubopik (main directorate for combating organized crime and corruption of the of the republic of belarus - Transl.) employees visited more than 700 belarusians who were previously “penciled for their radical views”. Of these, 230 people were brought to administrative responsibility, including 155 people for “extremism”.

A joint meeting of the committee of heads of personnel management bodies (educational work) of the ministries of defense of the CIS countries and the military-memorial committee of the soviet of ministers of defense of the CIS countries is taking place in minsk. The event is attended by representatives of Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

The state customs committee of belarus has reported on fighting food from “unfriendly countries”. In total, since January 1 last year, they found out more than 1.5 thousand violations of the food embargo. Customs officers did not allow to belarus about 8 thousand tons of food (worth $7 million). As an example, the state customs committee report cites the fact of interception of 2.5 tons of Milka confectionery products.