March 23, 2023 Ukraine and the World – Against russia’s Aggression. Sanctions in Action

3/23/2023
singleNews

“There is no nuclear escalation. The only country in the world that talks about nuclear issues is russia. There is no threat to russia, it is exclusively about helping Ukraine in its defence”, commented UK Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs James Cleverly on providing Ukraine with armor-piercing shells with depleted uranium. The country's Ministry of Defence also said depleted uranium is a standard component for munitions that has nothing to do with nuclear weapons or capabilities. “russia knows this, but is deliberately trying to misinform”, the Ministry said in a statement.

The first deliveries of Leopard tanks will begin at the end of March, said the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Germany to Ukraine Anka Feldhusen. “It is very important that we not only hand over weapons. We also train Ukrainian servicemen to return with weapons. And it will be soon, with tanks. The goal should be to deter russia. russia should not be able to attack either Ukraine or another neighboring country again. This is our goal – how to achieve this. The supply of weapons is already one component, we are doing it”, said Anka Feldhusen.

Germany has signed an agreement with Slovakia for the repair of Panzerhaubitze 2000 self-propelled howitzer for Ukraine, said German Ambassador to Ukraine Anka Feldhusen.

Ukrainian Special Forces units received from Poland 30 multipurpose wheeled armored personnel carriers Oncilla 4×4, intended for the removal of troops and cover in difficult weather conditions and in case of poor soil cross-country patency. Oncilla 4×4 has the second level of protection according to NATO standards and is armed with a 12.7 mm machine gun.

In the coming months, Lithuania will send Ukraine new military assistance. The package will include “anti-drones”, weapons and ammunition. The country will also provide military training for our servicemen and will continue to call on allies to step up their efforts.

In Lithuania, the Ukrainian military have begun training on a month-long course on the neutralization of explosive objects. The first training will be conducted by Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish and Lithuanian instructors. In total, four such courses are planned to be held during 2023.

The Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania in the first reading approved a draft law which prohibits citizens of russia and belarus from applying for citizenship, as well as buying real estate. At the same time, the country's Parliament in its resolution “On limiting russia's terrorist influence'” called on partner states to prepare steps for the complete international isolation of the rf.

During the hearings on the draft US Foreign Policy Budget 2024 in the US Senate, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called autocracy and russia's full-scale destructive aggression against Ukraine an immediate and acute threat to the national interests of the United States.

US National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby has said that the United States supports Ukraine's position on the issue of defence of Bakhmut.

US Department of Defense Spokesperson Patrick Ryder has confirmed that Ukraine will receive an older modification of American Abrams tanks, as this will speed up the Ukrainian servicemen’s mastering them and logistics to their destination.

The US Department of State's report on the human rights situation around the world alleges 19 types of abuses and violations by the russian occupiers in the war in Ukraine. These include: mass and illegal, extrajudicial killings; forced disappearances of people; torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, in particular, of children; arbitrary arrest or detention; political imprisonment or detention, including during “filtering” operations involving interrogation, torture, forced separation of families, forced deportation, and adoption of Ukrainian children into russian families; unlawful interference with privacy; punishment of family members for alleged misconduct of a relative; serious abuses during conflict, atrocities, abductions, torture and physical violence; severe restrictions on freedom of expression, in particular for media representatives accompanied by violence or threats against journalists, unreasonable arrests or harassment of journalists, censorship; severe restrictions on internet freedom; significant interference with freedom of peaceful assembly; severe restrictions on religious freedom; restriction of freedom of movement; the inability of citizens to vote in free and fair elections; serious and unreasonable restrictions on participation in political life; serious restrictions or harassment of national and international human rights organizations; lack of investigation and responsibility for gender-based violence; violence-related crimes against members of minorities or indigenous people, such as Crimean Tatars and ethnic Ukrainians; crimes related to violence against people of the LGBT community.

The United States has announced new sanctions against four companies and three people in Iran and Turkey for participating in the purchase of equipment to support Iranian programs to develop UAVs and weapons used to strike civilians in Ukraine. The Iranian Center for Defense Technology and Scientific Research, its purchasing firm Farazan Industrial Engineering Inc. and two other firms, as well as agents of those companies, fell under the sanctions.

“Japan will allocate $ 470 million in unilateral grant assistance, in particular for the energy sector and other industries, as well as $ 30 million in assistance for the supply of non-lethal weapons through the NATO trust fund”, said Prime Minister of japan Fumio Kishida.

Latvia will transfer medical equipment worth almost 300 thousand euros to Ukraine.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia Edgars Rinkēvičs has called for the speedy coordination of sanctions imposed against belarus with those against russia.

The Foreign Policy Committee of the National Council (Lower House of Parliament) of Switzerland has submitted a proposal to approve a program to support Ukraine for at least five billion francs (5.03 billion euros).

Ukraine and the International Monetary Fund have reached a staff-level agreement on a new $15.6 billion program for a 4- year period.

Since the beginning of the year, the EU has already provided Ukraine with EUR 4.7 billion in macro-financial assistance.

The European Court of Human Rights has scheduled a hearing in the interstate case “Ukraine v. russia” on human rights violations by the occupying authorities of Crimea for November 8, 2023.

Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court Karim Khan has said that russia not only deports Ukrainian children, but treats them as “war booty”.

A court in the German city of Wiesbaden fined €1,500 a man who went to work wearing a T-shirt with the symbol of russian aggression – the letter z. The fine must be paid in favor of the organization that helps Ukrainians.

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The largest bank in Switzerland, UBS, has begun mass inspections of its russian clients, demanding from them to provide documents confirming the legality of their stay in the country. UBS requires customers to provide copies of their country of residence passport or residence permit in Switzerland by May 5, 2023. “We reserve the right to block the above-mentioned banking relations from May 6, 2023, if the requested documents do not come to us by May 5”, the Bank said in letters to customers.

The United Kingdom has banned the provision of trust services to 1,730 individuals and legal entities in russia against whom sanctions have been imposed.

James O’Brien, head of the US’s Office of Sanctions Coordination, has said that G7 countries could oblige companies to affirm that their imported polished diamonds are not of russian origin. As part of international sanctions, companies from the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union are prohibited from buying diamonds from the russian alrosa corporation.

Moldova has blocked five sites of the russian propaganda agency sputnik.

According to the World Happiness Report, which is annually prepared at the request of the UN, russia ranks 70th. The happiest are citizens of Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Israel, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Luxembourg and New Zealand. Among them are countries that strongly support Ukraine, and which russia calls unfriendly to it.

In 2022, insurance companies with foreign participation almost did not provide insurance services to individuals and legal entities of the rf. In particular, such large companies as “alians zhizn”, “rb strakhovanie zhizni”, “raiffeisen life” have reduced services by 37-44%. For smaller companies, the figures are even worse, for example, for “turikum” the figure has decreased by almost half, in “chabb” and “air strakhovaia kompania” – by almost twenty times.

In 2022, the share of russian fish and seafood exports to the EU was only 4.5 %; mostly cod (47% of the total) and pollock (41%) were supplied. president of the association of pollock producers burlak said that the russians had to provide significant discounts on their products, in particular, the discount on pollock fillet reached € 600 per ton (according to EUMOFA, the cost of pollock fillets from China and the USA to the EU is € 3.5-4 thousand per ton). The russians are very concerned about the possible introduction of international sanctions, since the domestic russian market is unable to consume all the products from pollock.

At the end of 2022, the profit of the rosbank (under US and EU sanctions) decreased four times, to 4.9 billion rubles against 19.6 billion rubles in 2021.

The central bank of the rf has revealed the structure of russia's international reserves. As of March 1, they amounted to $ 574.2 billion, of which assets in foreign currency – $ 410 billion, monetary gold – $ 135.6 billion. In 2022-2023, the volume of reserves decreased by $ 42,886 billion. Information on russia's international reserves has been classified since March 2022 after a significant part (almost $ 300 billion) of russian foreign exchange reserves was blocked in the United States and Europe.

tinkoff-bank had to stop making transfers in dollars and euros to Mongolia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, but assured customers that transfers in Chinese yuan could be sent to a number of credit institutions in those countries.

According to analysts, the most import-dependent in russia are kaluga, ulyanovsk, samara, vladimir regions, as well as tatarstan. It was these regions that had a high share of the manufacturing industry in the gross regional product, a significant level of innovative development and a poly-industry model of specialization. Sanctions pressure will significantly reduce their potential, and they will be unable to overcome new challenges and threats on their own due to the lack of competencies of local specialists and the scientific and technical base. The rf’s dependence on foreign technologies in industry is 39 %.

russia is revising the taxation of oil companies to increase government revenues by obtaining a larger share of crude oil sales, the price of which often exceeds the “ceiling” set by the G7.

Due to the lack of money, regional and municipal authorities of the rf have significantly reduced funding for programs for the overhaul of housing and the purchase of new lifts for houses where planned replacements were to be made. Local chiefs of nizhny novgorod region and tatarstan buy lifts in installments, which they have never done before, the number of such transactions has tripled. In other regions, the market simply froze in anticipation of possible better times.

According to the plant “moscow electrical equipment and lifts”, due to problems with the supply of foreign components, the cost of production of lift equipment in russia increased by an average of 30-40 %.

On March 22, many radio channels of the temporarily occupied by russia Crimea reported that transport links with the mainland of the rf would stop in the near future, evacuation ferry flights were being prepared, and the population was advised to collect grab-and-go suitcases, stock up on fuel and food. The movement of sea transport in Sevastopol was stopped.

At the same time, the occupation authorities of Crimea stated that in 2023 enterprises of the temporarily occupied Crimea would have to pay for the water from the North Crimean Canal.

As of March 2023, the following models drive the most on russian roads in terms of the number of cars: VAZ-2107 (“zhiguli”, discontinued in 2012), Kia Rio, VAZ-2106 (discontinued in 2006) and three-door “niva”.

The six-month military contracts of most of prisoners- mercenaries of the wagner pmc, who are still alive, are running to their end. Now the kremlin is deciding their future fate.

In russia, the demand for business literature is falling: in February, according to various publishers, sales decreased by 10-28 %.

The russian national team was deprived of the right to participate in the World Figure Skating Championships, which started in Japan on March 22.

Hockey national teams of belarus and russia will not be able to participate in competitions under the auspices of the International Hockey Federation in the 2023/24 season. A statement following the IIHF council meeting said the council has drawn a conclusion that the return of the russian and belarusian teams is dangerous.

The High Court of Justice in London refused to uphold the claim of the belarusian company synesis against the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the UK demanding the lifting of sanctions imposed on it. EU sanctions were imposed on synesis on December 17, 2020. The main reason was the provision of the belarusian authorities with a video surveillance system with Kipod facial recognition, therefore the company “bears responsibility for providing support and technology to the ministry of internal affairs that enhances the capacity of the lukashenko regime to carry out human rights violations and repress civil society”. The United Kingdom has also joined the EU sanctions.

Yesterday, 90 migrants tried to enter Poland from Belarus, including citizens of Egypt, Afghanistan, India, Eritrea, Yemen, Syria, Iraq and Iran.