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

In Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), representatives of Saudi Arabia, Australia, Argentina, Bahrain, Bulgaria, Brazil, Great Britain, Denmark, Estonia, the European Union, Egypt, India, Spain, Italy, Jordan, Canada, Qatar, China, Kuwait, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, the United Arab Emirates, South Africa, Poland, the Republic of Korea, Romania, Slovakia, the Union of the Comoros, the United States of America, Turkey, Finland, France, the Czech Republic, Chile, Sweden, Japan, and the United Nations took part in the meeting of diplomatic advisers on national security and political directors of foreign ministries of the leading countries of the world on the key principles of restoring a sustainable and just peace for Ukraine. All the present reaffirmed their countries' commitment to the principles of the UN Charter, international Law and respect for the sovereignty and inviolability of the territorial integrity of states.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken thanked Turkey for “its leadership in the Black Sea Grain Initiative” and stressed the “urgent need to counteract the kremlin's inhumane use of food as a weapon of war”.

The Social Democratic Party of Germany, which is part of the ruling coalition, is in favor of supplying Ukraine with Taurus cruise missiles. “I do not rule out the possibility that, in alliance with the Americans, we will also supply additional systems, such as the Taurus”, said Nils Schmid, Spokesperson for the SPD faction in the Bundestag.

“The strike on the blood transfusion center in Kharkiv region is another proof of russia's inhuman behavior. Those responsible for this act of terror must be punished, and the Czech Republic will make efforts for this”, said Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic Jan Lipavský.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of France in its statement “condemns in the strongest terms” russia's massive missile attacks on August 5-6, in particular on a blood transfusion center in Kharkiv region, and stresses that the deliberate targeting of civilian objects is a war crime. France, in cooperation with other allies, will continue to help Ukraine further exercise its right to self-defense, as well as support the work of Ukrainian authorities and the International Criminal Court to bring to justice those responsible for the rf’s war crimes.

The government of the South Korea has decided to allow Korean businessmen to visit Ukraine to negotiate participation in reconstruction and restoration projects. The decision was made as an exception to the current rules, according to which Korean citizens are prohibited from visiting zones of armed conflicts under threat of punishment.

Today, almost 44.5 thousand Ukrainian refugees are registered in Berlin (Germany).

rf

JPMorgan Bank (USA) has stopped processing payments of the russian rosselkhozbank, which is under US and EU sanctions.

Last Friday (the last day of trading on the moscow stock exchange), the russian stock market suffered the strongest collapse in a month – by almost 4 %, having lost a total of 200 billion rubles of capitalization. As a result of trading, sberbank's shares fell by 1.8 %, gazprom's – by 1.6 %, rosneft’s – by 1.15 %, severstal's – by 3.9 %, sovcomflot's – by 4.9 %, mechel’s – by 5 %.

The russian aeroflot has problems with the timely replacement of the brakes that had become unusable: as of July 31, nine aircrafts flew with partially deactivated brakes. Last year, aeroflot reduced the cost of repairing its aircrafts fivefold: in 2021, the company spent 19.77 billion rubles to support aircrafts, in 2022 – only 3.86 billion rubles.

In August, tourist trips in russia rose by 29-33%.

Since the beginning of 2023, 41,465 russians have applied to the US judicial system for asylum – double the figure for all of 2022, which was a record in 10 years; in 2021, US courts heard 2,537 such cases – 16.3 times fewer than in 2023.

At the belarusian border, they tightened control by starting to check IMEI phones. At risk are those who have been brought to administrative responsibility under “political” articles in recent years; who often travel abroad and can use a foreign SIM card, as well as foreigners, first of all Ukrainians. belarusian mobile operators keep an archive not only of which SIM cards were in a certain mobile zone, but also which IMEI. By SIM cards and IMEI, they reconstruct the route of movement across the country of any telephone – and, accordingly, its owner.

Blocked on June 16 this year, the belarusian sports site pressball.by on August 4 began to work under a new address – resport.by. However, a day later, the belarusian ministry of information blocked it as well.

According to the agreement between the defense ministries of belarus and Tajikstan, belarusian military educational institutions will take Tajik servicemen for training.