December 8, 2024 Ukraine and the World - Against russia’s Aggression. Sanctions in Action

Ukraine has received the second batch of F-16 fighter jets from Denmark.

The government of Canada is considering sending Ukraine some of the firearms that are banned in the country. Minister of Public Safety of Canada Dominic LeBlanc has pointed out that those weapons belong with the battlefield, not with hunters or sport shooters.

White House Press Secretary Karin Jean-Pierre has reiterated that the current US administration is working to use all remaining funds to support Ukraine before the end of the term on January 20.

“Ukrnafta has received a EUR 80 million loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to build 100 MW of new generation.

Ukraine's GTS operator has agreed with Poland's gas transmission system operator Gaz-System to introduce guaranteed capacities for importing natural gas to Ukraine in the amount of about 5.15 million cubic meters per day from January 1 to September 30, 2025.

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“Approximately 80,000 United States Armed Forces personnel are assigned or deployed in NATO countries in Europe, including to reassure our allies and to deter further russian aggression”, said US President Joe Biden.

Canada will increase its military and political presence in the Arctic to counter threats from russia and a number of other countries trying to bring the region under their control, – said Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada Mélanie Joly. The Canadian government plans to deploy new patrol ships, destroyers, icebreakers and submarines, as well as to increase the number of aircrafts and drones in its Arctic region.

russians associated with the cryptocurrency market continue to be arrested around the world – this week, at the request of the United States, russian “king of cryptocurrencies” vasilyev, a former co-owner of the Wex (formerly Btc-e) crypto exchange, has been detained in Poland. From $500 million to $1 billion belonging to investors from various other countries were stolen from the accounts of this crypto exchange. In 2017, a russian citizen vinnik, the head of the Btc-e crypto exchange, was detained in Greece. He served part of his sentence in a Greek prison but was extradited to the United States in 2022.

The Kurzeme District Court of Latvia has sentenced the editor-in-chief of the russian propaganda portal “sputnik Latvia”, Latvian citizen Valentin Rozhentsov, to two years in prison for violating EU sanctions.

The central bank of the rf has warned of possible problems for banks due to deposits at 22% per annum.

In the russian primorsky krai, an officer has shot dead a 19-year-old conscript for refusing to go to war against Ukraine.

russia is conducting “trainings to test the security and resilience” of the russian Internet in case of disconnection from the global network. The trainings are being held in at least three regions of the rf – chechnya, dagestan and ingushetia.

The rf wants to ban the operation of the Amazon cloud platform and other foreign hosting providers.

russia will again tighten the provisions of the criminal code on treason and espionage. The fsb will have more grounds to prosecute foreigners for helping russia's “adversaries” and accuse russians of siding with the enemy – now also for “participation in the activities” of Ukrainian and pro-Ukrainian organizations. The amendments have been approved for the second reading by the state duma legislation committee. They will allow to sentence people to 12 or more years in prison even for reposting Ukrainian telegram channels.

Authorities of the rb are experiencing a shortage of labor – diplomatic missions have been ordered to look for cheap workers from third world countries where the average salary is lower than in the rb, in particular, in Vietnam.

There is a large gap in social pensions in the rb: the maximum old-age pension for a pensioner who worked as an employee or worker before retiring is 1,453.84 rubles. For those who continued to work, it is RUB 958.05. The minimum amount of labor pensions is 459.76 rubles. The maximum retirement pension for disabled veterans who do not work is 1,727.47 rubles. And for those who continue to work on well-deserved rest, it is 1,231.68 rubles. At this, the social pension, which women receive at the age of 60 and men at 65, is currently 218.9 rubles.

An evangelical preacher and political prisoner Nikolai Khilo is to be tried in minsk – he is accused of inciting hatred and calling for “harming national security”.

Updates to the rb’s list of extremist materials: YouTube channel “Chasiky tikayut”, Twitter accounts of “Pozirk”, “Zabka” and “vlad is love”. Facebook accounts “Beglyi v Ukrainu”, «Супольнасць беларусаў свету Бацькаўшчына», «Парламенцкая Беларусь», tiktok accounts “Zerkalo | Podrobno”, “Zerkalo Regiony”, “Zerkalo | Sudebnyie istorii”, “alena_mar6”, “Zerkalo I Regiony”, “myzha_info”, “racyjabelarus”, as well as the website budzma.org.