July 15, 2022 Ukraine and the World – Against russia’s Aggression. Sanctions in Action

The White House has explained that Ukraine continues to receive military aid within the framework of programs that do not stipulate a refund, and lend-lease will begin to be applied later. The aid is currently funded through the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) and the Presidential Drawdown Authority program.

NATO is confident that Ukraine properly ensures the storage and accounting of weapons it receives from allies in the exercise of the right to self-defense against russian aggression. A similar statement was made in the European Union, calling the information about arms smuggling from Ukraine “mass propaganda of the russian federation”.

The European Commission has suggested that the EU countries conclude an agreement with Azerbaijan to increase the import of natural gas and expand the pipeline. The draft memorandum, which needs government approval, is part of the EU's efforts to reduce dependence on russian gas following moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

The European Union has condemned putin's decision to simplify the procedure for obtaining russian citizenship for all Ukrainians and does not plan to recognize those passports.

The United Kingdom’s government has allocated 2.5 million pounds to help Ukraine investigate war crimes. The funds will be used by the General Prosecutor's Office of Ukraine.

The government of France will hand over 36 prefab bridges (23 to 46 meters long) to Ukraine. They should replace those destroyed during hostilities.

A fund-raising campaign for Polish-made Warmate kamikaze drones for Ukraine has begun in Poland.

The participants of the Ukraine Accountability Conference in the Hague created the Dialogue Group on Accountability for Ukraine. 45 participating countries agreed on the Political Declaration on cooperation to achieve a common result. The Dialogue Group established at this event aims to unite national, European and international initiatives for documentation and justice for international crimes.

US Ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, assured yesterday that the US remains with Ukraine until it defeats the “brutal aggression”. “While international experts are meeting in The Hague at the Conference on the prosecution of war crimes in Ukraine, russia is committing another horrific attack, taking the lives of innocent civilians in Vinnytsia”, Brink said.

EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell has said that the European Union should take more responsibility for its own security, strengthen its partnership with NATO, spend more money on defense, and above all, spend it more efficiently, that is, jointly.

According to the UN Refugee Agency, since the beginning of the russian invasion (February 24), 9,136,006 border crossings from Ukraine have been recorded. Poland became the leader in receiving Ukrainian refugees in the European Union: as of July 11, 1,221,596 Ukrainians were officially registered in the country. About 900,000 found refuge in Germany, 391,000 in the Czech Republic, and approximately 150,000 each in Turkiye and Italy. A little over 80,000 refugees are in Moldova, Romania and Slovakia. According to UN estimates, as of July 12, there were 1,625,531 refugees from Ukraine in russia.

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putin's aggression against Ukraine, international sanctions and the decline of the economy force the government of the russian federation to introduce a regime of total economy. All in all, in the next three years, the ministry of finance of the russian federation plans to reduce expenditures by 1.6 trillion rubles, freezing 59 out of 62 state programs and expenditure items.

The central bank has reported that the international reserves of the rf decreased by 2.4% from July 1 to July 8 and amount to $572.7 billion.

July 14, putin signed a law according to which information on the size of russia's gold reserves and state currency reserves is a state secret.

the national projects of the kremlin, but in fact the list of initiatives with which putin went to the 2018 elections, promising to overcome poverty, catch up with the world economy and pull the country out of the demographic pit, continue to collapse. Initially abandoning the goal of bringing russia to the top 5 economies of the world and postponing for 10 years the task of halving the poverty level, now putin has announced the postponement of the “safe and high-quality motorways” project. Implementation of this project, within the framework of which it was planned to build and reconstruct 1,800 km of roads of federal importance by 2024, has been postponed to 2030, according to the list of putin's instructions published on the kremlin's website.

Previously, putin abandoned the task of making russia the 5th largest economy in the world in terms of GDP and surpassing Germany in 2024. The goal of halving poverty, originally set for 2024, has also been delayed by six years. At the same time, the deadlines for plans to increase the average life expectancy of russians to 78 years, to enter the top 10 countries in terms of the quality of general education and the volume of scientific research and development, and to increase the number of people employed in small and medium-sized businesses to 25 million have been postponed to 2030. According to experts and the opinion of ordinary citizens of the rf, after putin's adventure against Ukraine, now all these intentions will remain only on the papers of officials and in people's dreams.

The failure of the blitzkrieg for the seizure of Ukraine, the transition of the war to a long-term stage, the death of tens of thousands of russian soldiers have already led to thorough checks and threaten with high-profile personnel decisions in the defense-industrial complex and the state defense procurement, on which 20 trillion rubles have been spent from the budget of the rf over the past 10 years.

The russian gas market has panicked due to the fact that the EU is preparing to sign a gas import agreement with Azerbaijan to reduce dependence on the russian federation after the cessation of russian gas supplies to Europe.

st. petersburg’s mps are preparing an appeal to the government of the rf with a request to include the region in the program of providing free excursions for schoolchildren as part of the national project “tourism and hospitality industry”. The members of parliament justify their appeal to the russian authorities by the desire to prevent “protest and nihilistic moods among the youth”.

Despite all the efforts of russia to stimulate the tourist industry in the temporarily occupied russian Crimea, the summer season of this year on the peninsula has become a complete failure. According to the pro-russian local authorities, the number of tourists who visited Crimea in June was 40% less compared to the same period last year. According to forecasts, this trend will continue in July and August.

The Singaporean multinational stock exchange company Trafigura has sold its 10% in rosneft and withdrawn from the joint project “East Oil”. Since May 15, Trafigura has stopped all trade operations with rosneft, as the russian company is now under EU sanctions.

Refuting the russian reports, the social network TikTok emphasized that it will not lift the ban on working in russia, and posting videos from russian users will be impossible, as before.

Against the background of the russian crisis, President of Kazakhstan, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, instructed the government to create favorable conditions for the attraction of foreign companies leaving the russian market. He reminded that “every second foreign company has stopped operations in russia, and currently there is a global struggle for investment capital”.

The Saeima of Latvia has adopted amendments to the law on energy, which provide for a ban on the supply of natural gas from russia from January 1, 2023.

US Under Secretary of Commerce for Industry and Security Alan Estevez has stated that the export control measures introduced by Western countries against russia have led to a decrease by74%.in the supply of semiconductors to the russian federation.

Large-scale sanctions and most international companies’ leaving russia will lead to the fact that by 2025, the fleet of russian civil aviation aircrafts will be reduced by two-thirds of the current number, said US Under Secretary of Commerce for Industry and Security Alan Estevez during the US Senate’s meeting on banking issues. According to him, Western sanctions will lead to the fact that within 3 years, russia will not be able to use 50 to 70 percent of its fleet of civil aviation aircrafts. Estevez added that he expects most of the aircrafts to be dismantled for parts and components to maintain the tolerable condition of other aircrafts.

The International and European Weightlifting Federations have banned athletes from russia and belarus from participating in competitions under the auspices of these organizations.