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The FBI wants to question a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard in connection with the leak of highly classified military documents on the Ukraine war, according to a report. The guardsman has been identified by the New York Times as 21-year-old Jack Teixeira, who reportedly oversaw an online group where about 20 to 30 people shared their love of guns, racist memes and video games.

Ukraines armed forces have said Russian troops are attempting to surround the embattled city of Bakhmut from the north and the south. Every day in Bakhmut area, the enemy makes 40 to 50 offensive and assault attempts, launches more than 500 strikes using the entire range of available weapons, said Brig Gen Oleksiy Hromov, deputy chief of the Ukrainian armed forces general staffs main operational department.

Russias defence ministry claimed its troops had already surrounded Bakhmut, but Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of Russias Wagner mercenary group, said it was too early to say. Prigozhin, whose forces have spearheaded much of the fighting for the embattled city, was responding to a statement by the Russian defence ministry that said Moscows forces were blocking Ukrainian forces from getting in or out of Bakhmut.

Germany has approved a request by Poland to export five old German MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine, officials in Berlin have said.

The Kremlin has denied a report that Vladimir Putin personally approved the arrest of Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter imprisoned in Russia. According to a Bloomberg report, which cited unnamed sources, the Russian president had personally endorsed Gershkovichs arrest for espionage. Russias deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, has suggested Moscow may be willing to discuss a potential prisoner swap for Gershkovich after his trial.

Ukraines foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, has said his country would not change its demand that Russia must withdraw its forces from all of Ukraine including Crimea. Kyiv categorically disagrees with the idea that Crimea is somehow special and should not be returned to Ukraine, as any other part of our territory, Kuleba said in an address to the Black Sea security conference.

Two civilians have been killed and two others were wounded by Russian artillery and aerial attacks in Kherson region in southern Ukraine, the local governor, Oleksandr Prokudin, said.

Norways foreign ministry has said it has decided to expel 15 Russian embassy officials in Oslo. The Russians declared persona non grata are not regular diplomats, but intelligence officers under diplomatic cover. Their activities are a threat to Norwegian interests, Norwegian foreign minister Anniken Huitfeldt said. Russias foreign ministry said it would respond to Norways expulsion of its 15 diplomats.

Swedish prosecutors said they had charged a 52-year-old man with illegally possessing and spreading secret and sensitive information about a large number of military installations. I consider this a gross crime as it concerns a large number of installations that are significant for Swedens ability to defend itself in the case of war, senior prosecutor Lars Hedvall said in a statement.

Serbia never sold weapons or ammunition to Ukraine or Russia, president Aleksandar Vui has insisted, following a leaked secret Pentagon report that said Serbia had pledged to send arms to Kyiv or had sent them already. Vui said he was quite certain that Serbian ammunition would appear on one side or the other in the battlefield in Ukraine, after having been exported to Turkey, Spain or the Czech Republic.

Russias prosecutor general said it had opened an investigation into a video showing Russian soldiers apparently beheading a Ukrainian prisoner of war lying on the ground. It comes a day after President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged international leaders to act, saying the world could not ignore the evil footage, which circulated on Telegram, Twitter and other social media channels, causing revulsion among Ukrainians.

Authorities are working to identify the identity of a Ukrainian prisoner of war whose beheading video emerged on Wednesday, Ukraines deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar said. The Guardian has not independently verified the origins and veracity of the two videos, but Ukrainian authorities are treating them as genuine.

Energoatom, Ukraines nuclear power company, has claimed that a Russian mine exploded near one of the reactors at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP). Europes largest nuclear power station has been occupied by Russian forces since March 2022, with both Ukraine and Russia claiming that the other side has shelled the plant, risking a nuclear incident.

Alexei Navalny, Russias most prominent opposition leader, has a mystery ailment in jail that could be some sort of slow-acting poison, and has lost 8kg in weight in just over two weeks, his spokesperson, Kira Yarmysh, has said. We do not exclude that at this very time Alexei Navalny is being slowly poisoned, being killed slowly so that it attracts less attention, Yarmysh said in a post on Twitter. He is being held in a punishment cell with acute pain without medical help, she said.

Key members of a Ukrainian state orchestra were refused visas to play a series of concerts in the UK this month in a catastrophe that the promoter says cost it more than 100,000 (88,000).

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Russia-Ukraine war live: US air national guardsman suspected of leaking secret documents to be arrested - The Guardian

KYIV, Ukraine - Ihors comrades were eager to show us something special. A cone, the remnants of a Russian X-101 missile that didnt make it to its final destination. The 23-year-old clean-shaven specialist grinned slightly, on his shoulder a soviet era Man-portable air-defense system (MANPAD). Ihor is the 1stPresidential Brigade MANPAD specialist.

After months of training, he was called in December for his first combat mission around Kyiv. When alerts sounded, indicating that a Russian missile or drone was inbound, his squad rushed into position.

When he spotted the missile in flight, Ihor fired the first shot he would ever fire in combat.There was a loud sizzle of a round leaving the MANPAD, followed by cheers from his fellow guardians of the sky.

"At first, I didn't understand anything, then I realized that this is my first rocket hit, and I was very happy." He told us through an interpreter.

Ukrainian air defense members watch the skies to defend against Russian missile and drone attacks. (Fox News)

INSIDE THE MASSIVE OPERATION TO TRAIN THOUSANDS OF UKRAINE TROOPS AHEAD OF SPRING COUNTEROFFENSIVE

That X-101 is a personal trophy to him, but it also serves as a reminder to the squad of how important every little shot can be to preventing destruction of infrastructure, to protecting civilian lives. The Brigade has operated since 2014 when bitterness between Russian and Ukrainian loyalists boiled over to a civil conflict in the Donbas region.

Since the beginning of Russias full scale invasion, theyve operated around Kyiv, taking part in the defense of city in the early days of the battles of Irpin, Bucha and Moschun. Under the command of the National Guard of Ukraine, they are on shift at all times, ready to jump into action as soon as the air raid sirens sound. They use a mix of Soviet and Western-provided technology, including Javelins, Stingers and MLAWS.

Mykhailo, is a gunner for the brigade. Originally from Luhansk, he has been a guardsman since 2014 and operates the ZU-23 barreled auto-cannon, a soviet era anti-air gun.The big gun is jury-rigged on the back of a flatbed truck. Mobility is an absolute necessity when they try to intercept the path of inbound warheads that can come from any direction.

"Currently, this weapon is effective for shooting down shaheeds, kamikaze drones. UAV kamikaze Shaheeds." But there are limits, he told us. The old weapon will not be effective against helicopters or other Russian aircraft that dont fly close enough to be in range of the old Soviet gun. "These are outdated weapons, and we need something more modern and more technological"

A member of the Ukrainian force dedicated to defending the country's skies from Russian attacks. (Fox News)

WAIT IN LINE: RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER LEFT WAITING FOR VISA TO ENTER US AHEAD OF UN MEETING

To call the weapons "outdated" may only be scratching the surface. The ZU-23 he operates was made in the 1960s, and the MANPAD that Ihor uses is almost three times his age.

Leaked documents earlier this week from the Pentagon indicated that in late February, the Ukrainian air defense systems were set to begin running out by Mid-May. Ukraine relies heavily on these Soviet-era guns in their arsenal, and without them Russia would have an advantage on Ukrainian frontline positions and civilian targets

"The number of means that arrived from the West is not sufficient, and the number of rockets is certainly not sufficient. That is why we emphasize today that we need the missiles and air defense systems themselves, in order to replace the Soviet-made air defense systems," Said Col Yuriy Ignat, a spokesperson with the Ukraine Air Command "After all, [if] these systems are destroyed and fail, we do not have spare parts, because all this equipment is produced in Russia, just like missiles. Therefore, the only way out for us is the transition to NATO standards and weapons samples."

The U.S. has, since the end of February, seemed to recognize this weakness. The Biden administration last week authorized $2.6 billion in military assistance, which included air-defense munitions and systems such as National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS), three air surveillance radars and 30mm and 23mm anti-aircraft ammunition. Ukrainian troops have also completed training on the PATRIOT Missile Battery earlier this year.

A member of Ukraine's 1stPresidential Brigade looking to the sky. (Fox News)

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But Ukraine has still not received any indication as to whether it will be provided with the prized goal of Western combat aircraft like the F-16, which would be a significant upgrade over their Mig-29 fighters. One Ukrainian combat pilot who spoke with Fox News with the call sign "Moon Fish" says the Mig-29s are just a stopgap.

"We are running low on the spare parts, on the armament, on the missiles. And overall, yes, it is a great boost. It is a great possibility to fill the gaps filled with fuel, fill up, from the losses. Together with that, It does not provide us with any sort of new capabilities that we desire."

Despite old equipment, the 1stPresidential Brigade does not lack a sense of purpose. They know when the attack is launched, the mobile air defense volunteers are all that stands between a deadly inbound warhead and the people of Ukraine. "It all depends on the gunner," says Mikhailo.

Bohdan Glushko contributed to this report.

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Every shot counts: the mobile air defense protecting Ukraine's skies at a moment's notice - Fox News

BERLIN, April 13 (Reuters) - Germany has approved Poland's request to export five old MiG-29 fighter jets to bolster Ukraine's air power against the Russian invasion, the German defence ministry said on Thursday.

Poland's defence ministry did not immediately comment.

German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said the request had arrived Thursday, and that Berlin's same-day approval showed that Germany could be relied upon.

Germany inherited 24 MiG-29 jets from the East German GDR during reunification in 1990. At the time, the aircraft were seen as among the most advanced fighter jets in the world.

In 2004, Berlin passed on 22 of the aircraft to Poland. Of the remaining two jets, one was destroyed in a crash and one is on show at a museum.

Poland needs Berlin's consent to send its remaining jets to a third country.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said during a visit to Warsaw last week that Poland would help form a coalition of Western powers to supply warplanes to Kyiv.

Ukraine, which hopes to launch a counteroffensive in the coming weeks or months, wants to secure fighter jets to defend against air strikes.

Western countries have so far been reluctant to send advanced fighter jets such as F-16's to Kyiv, but some countries have stepped in to send old MiG-29 jets that Ukraine already uses.

Reporting by Sabine Siebold, Matthias Williams, Andrey Sychev and Anna Woldarczak-Semczuk; Editing by Matthias Williams and Mike Harrison

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Germany allows Poland to export old fighter jets to Ukraine - Reuters

In the first weeks of the ongoing war in Ukraine, the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) lost some of its best fighter jets in significant numbers, as it underestimated Ukraines air power, said the top spokesperson for the Ukrainian Air Force.

Yuri Ihnat, the spokesman for the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, said in a recent interview that the Ukrainian Air Force is six times smaller than Russias VKS; therefore, the Russians believed they would not face much resistance and were not careful.

I want to note that the Russian planes shot down in the first weeks of the war were among the best. These included Su-34, Su-30, Su-35, and many helicopters, said Ihnat.

Russian aviation suffered losses at first. When they underestimated our aviation, when they believed their propaganda that everything had already been destroyed here, that a walk in the sky would be easy for them, he continued.

He further said that the Russians enjoyed a significant advantage in technology and numbers to show off the Ukrainian Air Forces resilience in countering the Russian Air Force.

The Russians had such an advantage. And if you add more technology that you invested in Russian aircraft. That is, the modernization of the Su-27 into the Su-30, then the Su-34 appeared, the Su-35, Ihnat noted.

Perhaps Ihnat is correct in asserting that despite the overwhelming technological and numerical superiority of the Russian Aerospace Forces, the Ukrainian military did manage to keep Ukraines airspace contested.

However, it is not Ukraines air superiority that has kept the Russian military from establishing complete control over the Ukrainian airspace, but rather the Ukrainian surface-to-air missile systems which denied airspace to Russian combat aviation assets.

As EurAsian Times has discussed in extensive detail, advanced Russian fighters, like the Su-30SM and Su-35S, have remained very effective and lethal against Ukrainian aircraft throughout the war.

Additionally, the Ukrainian Air Force is outnumbered by the VKS. There have also been instances where the VKS has deployed around 10-12 fighter jets against one Ukrainian fighter.

This is evident even from the documented losses of air defense assets on both sides, where Ukraines losses are much steeper than Russias.

Ukraines pre-war inventory of fighters comprised around 30 Su-27s and roughly 50 MiG-29s which can also be used for air-to-ground operations.

So far, Ukraine has lost up to 17 MiG-29s and nine Su-27s, according to the latest figures compiled by the military tracking blog Oryx based on visual confirmations. Of these, one MiG-29 and one Su-27 were destroyed on the ground.

Of the 16 MiG-29s shot down from the skies, 12 losses were documented between February and April 2022. Likewise, in the case of eight Su-27s shot down, five of them were documented in the same timeframe.

Russias losses so far comprise only two Su-35S and eleven Su-30SMs, of which five Su-30s have been destroyed on the ground, as documented by Oryx. Of these losses, only five Su-30s and one Su-35S were lost between February and April 2022.

This means that from February to April 2022, the Russian Air Force suffered only six documented losses of its multi-role and air superiority fighters, as opposed to the 17 losses of the similar aircraft type sustained by the Ukrainian Air Force.

Russia has lost many Su-34 and Su-25 strike aircraft, but even those losses cannot simply be attributed to Ukraines air superiority.

Ukraine fielded medium and long-range air defenses, like the S-300s and Buk-M1s, which forced the Russian fighter jets to fly at altitudes below 4500 meters, right into the range of the man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS) that have accounted for a significant number of shoot-downs of Russian aircraft.

This has been admitted by a retired-Russian fighter pilot in a previous interview with EurAsian Times, wherein he described the effectiveness of Ukrainian MANPADS against advanced Russian fighter jets.

Most of our Su-35s, Su-24s, and Su-34s have been hit while flying at low altitudes, the retired Russian pilot told EurAsian Times on condition of anonymity in October 2022.

Therefore, since the onset of the war in February, thousands of MANPADS of different types from several countries have been supplied to the Ukrainian forces across the country, with more on their way.

In the case of Su-34, a strike aircraft, the significant losses suffered by this aircraft type can be attributed to its wide deployment for ground attacks using tactics requiring fighter pilots to fly their aircraft dangerously close to the ground.

While the Su-34 Fullback is highly equipped to conduct precision air-to-surface strikes from standoff ranges, as EurAsian Times discussed earlier, the aircraft is mainly employed for old-fashioned seek-and-destroy missions involving the plane going to the target area, visually acquiring the target, and then attacking.

The severe depletion of its inventory of precision-guided munitions has prompted the Russian military to rely heavily on unguided bombs. The Russian fighters must fly low to deliver these, making them vulnerable to the Ukrainian MANPADS.

Ukraines air denial strategy worked for a while, but then the Russian military adapted to the circumstances and began employing heavy-duty dumb bombs modified with aerial guidance wing kits.

These bombs enable the Russian aircraft to drop the bombs from a standoff range at a relatively low cost, allowing the Russian pilots to stay outside the areas covered by Ukrainian air defense systems.

As per reports, since October 2022, Russian fighter jets have been employing guided bombs, particularly the modified FAB-500M-62 bombs, believed to have been equipped with an aerial guidance kit called Modul Planirovaniya I Korrektsi (MPK), or gliding and correction module.

For four months now, bombers, fighters, and long-range aircraft have been operating with guided weapons from distances inaccessible to enemy air defense, the pro-Russian Fighter-bomber Telegram channel reportedly said on February 22, 2023.

Separately, I clarify our JDAM [Joint Direct Attack Munition], which we call UMPC. It is used almost every day, many times a day, and not one bomb at a time. Hundreds of bombs have already been dropped from the UMPC, the Fighter-bomber channel said.

Because FAB-500 is an unguided air-dropped bomb, to begin with, and it is equipped with a high explosive warhead, it is designed to have a broad area effect through blast overpressure and fragmentation of the casing.

Therefore, this weapon would be most effective against area targets such as Ukrainian trench lines, other fortification networks, and areas with large concentrations of Ukrainian forces.

These new types of bombs have emerged as a formidable challenge for the Ukrainian Air Force, as is evident from recent remarks made by Ihnat after Russian Su-35 jets attacked Ukraines northeastern Sumy Oblast with 11 guided bombs on March 24.

It is an extremely big threat when guided air bombs, gliding bombs, can fly far and the aircraft do not enter the kill zone of our air defenses, said Ihnat shortly after this attack.

The Russian military has a large stockpile of the FAB-500 bombs, which makes it possible to equip them with wing kits in large numbers at a fraction of the cost that goes into making other advanced precision-guided munitions.

Some recent unconfirmed Russian media reports have said that Russia plans to increase the production of these guided bombs because of their extremely high efficiency on the Ukrainian battlefield.

Link:
Ukraine Shot Down Russias Best Fighter Jets, Inc. Su-35, Su-34, In The Initial Weeks Of War Ukrainian Air Force - EurAsian Times

4 Mins Ago

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin testifies before a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on President Biden's proposed budget request for the Department of Defense for fiscal year 2024, on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., March 28, 2023.

Kevin Lamarque | Reuters

U.S. officials have identified the person suspected of leaking classified government documents as 21-year-old Jack Teixeira, NBC News reported.

Officials speaking on condition of anonymity said they have been tracking Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, for some time and that an arrest is imminent. The New York Times first identified Teixeira as the suspect on Thursday.

Chelsey Cox

57 Mins Ago

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov delivers a speech during a session of the State Duma, the lower house of parliament, in Moscow, Russia February 15, 2023.

Russian State Duma | Reuters

Russia's Ambassador to the United States called on the State Department to process the visa request of Russian Foreign Minister SergeiLavrov ahead of a meeting at the United Nations in New York.

Lavrov is slated to chair several UN Security Council meetings during the last week of April. Russia currently holds the one-month rotating presidency of the UN Security Council.

Anatoly Antonov said the visa request was submitted to the U.S. Embassy in Moscow at the end of March. "However, not a single entry permission has been granted so far," Antonov said, adding that the embassy canceled a visa appointment on March 31 without providing an explanation.

"We urge Washington to immediately issue visas for our delegation, as well as for our journalists. Failure to do that is a violation of the United States' obligations as the host country of the UN headquarters," he said.

Antonov added that the U.S. must also grant flight permissions for the Russian delegation "without any conditions or restrictions."

Amanda Macias

An Hour Ago

A U.S. Air Force Raptor F22, F16 fighter jets and MIG-29 of the Polish Air Force take part in a NATO Air Force military drill on October 12, 2022 in Lask, Poland.

Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

Germany approved Poland's request to transfer five Soviet-designed MiG 29 fighter jets Germany previously owned to Ukraine, the Associated Press reported.

Polish President Andrzej Duda said his country already had provided four MiG-29 jets to Ukraine, with four more in the process of getting handed over and another six being prepared, according to the AP report.

Germany itself has not supplied Ukraine with jets.

Melodie Warner

2 Hours Ago

The European Union will launch an 11th wave of sanctions on Russia and seek to crack down on efforts to evade economic penalties introduced in the wake of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a top EU official told CNBC Thursday.

"Europe has rolled out 10 packages of sanctions. We will have another package," Mairead McGuinness, EU commissioner for financial stability, financial services and capital markets union, told CNBC's Joumanna Bercetche at the International Monetary Fund's spring meeting in Washington, D.C.

EU countrieshave been in talksabout drawing up a fresh round of sanctions against Russia in recent weeks and McGuinness confirmed an 11th package of measures is on its way.

Read the full report here.

Ryan Browne

3 Hours Ago

The Biden administration is looking at expanding how it monitors social media sites and chatrooms after U.S. intelligence agencies failed to spotclassified Pentagon documents circulating online for weeks, according to a senior administration official and a congressional official briefed on the matter.

The possible change in the intelligence-gathering process is just one potential shift as officials scramble to determine not onlyhow the documents leakedbut also how to prevent another damaging incident.

President Joe Biden and other officials were dismayed when they learned the documents had been online for at least a month. Some documents may have appeared as early as January, according to Bellingcat, the open-source investigative group.

Read the full report here.

NBC News

2 Hours Ago

Among the latest revelations from leaked Pentagon documents that have been circulating on social media are details of infighting in the Russian government, the New York Times reported.

NBC has not independently verified the report, and the Times concedes that it has not been able to authenticate the documents in question. NBC's reporting on the previous batch of documents that appeared online suggested that some of them may have been altered.

"The depth of the infighting inside the Russian government appears broader and deeper than previously understood, judging from a newly discovered cache of classified intelligence documents that has been leaked online," the Times wrote.

Natasha Turak

3 Hours Ago

Aerial view of the Pentagon building photographed on Sept. 24, 2017.

Bill Clark | CQ-Roll Call Group | Getty Images

The Department of Defense is moving to further restrict access to sensitive information following a massive intelligence leak that's disclosed classified U.S. government planning and assessments on Ukraine and a number of other countries.

"The Department of Defense say they have taken steps to further restrict access to sensitive information," White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters in response to reporting from the Washington Post that the leaks were disseminated in an online chat platform.

"Look, we are certainly reviewing the national security implications of the disclosure and I can add that to mitigate the impact the release of these documents have on our U.S. national security and also on our allies and partners as well, so this is something we are taking very seriously," she said. "There is an ongoing investigation. DOD has taken steps to restrict access to these documents and definitely don't want don't want to get ahead of what is happening."

Natasha Turak

4 Hours Ago

The source behind the trove of classified documents leaked to social media that have become the biggest U.S. intelligence breach since Edward Snowden worked on a U.S. military base, according to reporting by the Washington Post.

NBC has not independently verified the report, whose main source is a minor who was granted anonymity by the Washington Post. The Post said it also reviewed approximately 300 photos of classified documents, most of which have not been made public.

The minor communicated with the leaker for years on an invite-only group chat on the online gaming platform Discord, whose members, the Post wrote, were "united by their mutual love of guns, military gear and God."

The Post reports that the leaker shared "what appeared to be near-verbatim transcripts of classified intelligence documents that [he] indicated he had brought home from his job on a 'military base'," the location of which he did not disclose.

The White House responded to the reporting, saying the Department of Defense has taken steps to further restrict access to sensitive information and that an investigation is ongoing.

Natasha Turak

5 Hours Ago

Wholesale food market in Moscow.

Picture Alliance | Picture Alliance | Getty Images

Russia's headline inflation fell to 3.5% in March, down by 7.5% from the previous year, with the large contrast mainly due to Russia's post invasion inflation spike in March of 2022, Goldman Sachs said.

Last month's figure is below the Russian central bank's long-run target of 4%, but Goldman analysts believe this level is temporary and will rise to approach 7% by the end of 2023.

"Looking forward, we think inflation is near its trough and that it will remain near 4% in Q2-2023. However, we expect base effects to slowly fade going forward ... Adding to this are exchange rate pressures stemming from the weakening of the Ruble since November, which has depreciated more than 10% against the USD and around 12% vis--vis the RMB year-to-date," Goldman wrote in a note Thursday.

"We forecast the weaker Ruble to eventually pass-through consumer prices, specifically the mostly imported non-food goods in Russia. From H2-2023 on, therefore, we forecast inflation to re-rise and stand close to 7% by year-end."

Natasha Turak

6 Hours Ago

Ukrainian state gas company Naftogaz said Russia has been ordered to pay it $5 billion in compensation for illegally seizing its assets in Crimea in 2014. The order came from The Hague's Arbitration Tribunal in the Netherlands.

The ruling is a "key victory on the energy front," Naftogaz CEO Oleksiy Chernyshov said of the news. He added that he expects more wins for Ukraine. Russia illegally annexed Ukraine's Crimean peninsula in 2014.

"Despite Russia's attempts to obstruct justice, the Arbitration Tribunal ordered Russia to compensate Naftogaz for losses of $5 billion," Naftogaz said in a statement. "Russia must now comply with this decision in accordance with its obligations under international law."

It's not clear how Russia's payment will be enforced, and the Russian government did not immediately respond to the ruling. But if Russia refuses to pay, Naftogaz said it could launch a "process of recognition and admission to enforce the award in the territory of those states where assets of the Russian Federation are located."

Natasha Turak

8 Hours Ago

Russia announced that it would cut oil production by 500,000 barrels per day in March after the West slapped price caps on Russian oil and oil products.

Picture Alliance | Picture Alliance | Getty Images

The Group of Seven advanced economies is not expected to update its price cap on Russian oil in the coming weeks amid contrasting views on whether the policy is truly denting the Kremlin's revenues.

The G-7, alongside the European Union and Australia, decided late last year to impose a cap of $60 a barrel on Russian oil in an effort to ratchet up the pressure on Moscow. As part of the agreement, they said they would review this cap in mid-March.

However, despite calls to do so from several countries in Europe, the threshold was not revised last month even as oil prices fell from the levels seen in the two months prior to mid-March. If a revision had taken place, the $60 barrel level would likely have been reduced.

Read the full story here.

Silvia Amaro

8 Hours Ago

The grain harvester collects wheat on the field near the village of Zgurivka in the Kyiv region, while Russia continues the war against Ukraine. August 9, 2022.

Maxym Marusenko | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Ukraine's gross domestic product dropped by nearly a third in 2022, which was dominated by Russia's full-scale invasion that began on Feb. 24 of that year.

The GDP of the war-battered country fell by 29.1%, Ukraine's state statistics service reported, although this was just slightly better than the government's forecast of a 30% drop.

More than 8 million people have fled Ukraine as refugees, amounting to around 20% of the country's population. Russia's war has killed tens of thousands of people, devastated industries and destroyed and damaged vital energy infrastructure around the country.

Russia's naval blockade of Ukraine's Black Sea ports has also throttled the majority of Ukraine's vital grain and produce exports, which comprise a significant portion of the world's supply of soft commodities such as grain, corn, and sunflower seeds. Exports as a whole were down 35% in 2022 from the year before, Ukraine's economy ministry said.

Still, Kyiv says GDP may grow 1% in 2023 due to improvements in the retail, transportation and construction sectors.

Natasha Turak

9 Hours Ago

The European Commissioner for the economy, Paolo Gentiloni, has hailed the EU's swift transition away from its dependency on Russian gas and said next winter will be less challenging.

"We were expecting a terrible winter, a winter of recession and problems with energy supplies, blackouts," he told CNBC's Joumanna Bercetche in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. "We didn't have recession and we were able to go out from dependency from Russian gas in eight months. I think, amazing results."

Asked whether he believed the energy crisis was over, he said: "I think it will be a challenge also for next winter, maybe a less dramatic challenge than it has been in the past winter, because we should remember we had a more than 40% dependency from Russian fossil fuels, and this is now down around 7%."

He said the EU would be refiling storage from the end of April without Russian gas and said it was important to diversify pipelines, noting increased Chinese demand following its lockdown reopening may bring liquefied gas prices up.

"More optimistically, the big, big challenge was last winter, next winter will also be challenging but we already know we were able to do something amazing," Gentiloni said.

Jenni Reid

10 Hours Ago

Ukraine's Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal attends a news conference, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine March 3, 2023.

Stringer | Reuters

Ukraine secured a $200 million World Bank grant to fund the restoration of its energy sector.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said the funds will go toward rebuilding the power grid and heat supply systems in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Sumy and cities in the Chernihiv region.

Russia has targeted Ukraine's energy infrastructure in waves of air strikes, causing power outages for millions of people.

"Energy infrastructure has suffered $11 billion in damages over the last year and is one of the most critical areas whereUkraine needs urgent support," World Bank Managing Director of Operations Anna Bjerde said in a statement."We are grateful for strong partnership with Ukraine and development partners to support this critical sector and act fast."

Shmyhal previously named energy as one of Ukraine's key sectors for rebuilding the economy.

He added that Ukraine and the World Bank will intensify three projects in energy, transport infrastructure and health care as part of reconstruction.

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Ukraine war live updates: U.S. officials identify leaked documents suspect as 21-year-old Air National Guardsman; Germany approves Polands transfer of...