The U.S. will close the last avenue for Russia to pay its billions in debt back to international investors on Wednesday, making a Russian default on its debts for the first time since the Bolshevik Revolution all but inevitable.
The Treasury Department said in a notification that it does not plan to renew the license to allow Russia to keep paying its debtholders through American banks.
Since the first rounds of sanctions, the Treasury Department has given banks a license to process any bond payments from Russia. That window expires at midnight May 25.
There had already been signs that the Biden administration was unwilling to extend the deadline. At a press conference heading into the Group of Seven finance minister meetings in Koenigswinter, Germany, last week, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the window existed “to allow a period of time for an orderly transition to take place, and for investors to be able to sell securities.”
“The expectation was that it was time-limited,” Yellen said.
Without the license to use U.S. banks to pay its debts, Russia would have no ability to repay its international bond investors. The Kremlin has been using JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup as its conduits to pay its obligations.
Jay Auslander, a prominent sovereign debt lawyer who previously litigated other debt crises like the one in Argentina, said at this point most of the institutional investors in Russian debts have likely sold their holdings, knowing this deadline was coming. Those who are still holding the debts are either distressed debt investors or those willing to wait to litigate it over the next few years.
“The majority who wanted out have gotten out. The only issue is finding buyers,” he said.
The Kremlin appears to have foreseen the likelihood that the U.S. would not allow Russia to keep paying on its bonds. The Russian Finance Ministry prepaid two bonds on Friday that were due this month to get ahead of the May 25 deadline.
The next payments Russia will need to make on its debts are due on June 23. Like other Russian debt, those bonds have a 30-day grace period — which would cause default by Russia to be declared by late July, barring the unlikely scenario that the Russia-Ukraine war would come to an end before then.
Investors have been almost certain of Russia going into default for months now. Insurance contracts that cover Russian debt have priced a 80% likelihood of default for weeks, and rating agencies like Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s have placed the country’s debt deep into junk territory.
Russia has not defaulted on its international debts since the 1917 Revolution, when the Russian Empire collapsed and the Soviet Union was created. Russia defaulted on its domestic debts in the late 1990s during the Asian Financial Crisis but was able to recover from that default with the help of international aid.
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«Фактично туди для наступу кинута вся потуга російської армії, яка в них ще залишилася»
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Two blocks from a casino and Burger King is a medium-sized room covered with a blue carpet that until four months ago was occasionally used to welcome personnel starting their jobs at the U.S. European Command headquarters.
The fourth-floor room in the General Bernard Rogers Conference Center on a U.S. Army base in Germany has become the center of Western efforts to give billions of dollars in weapons and nonlethal aid to Ukrainian forces to help Kyiv push back against Russia’s invasion of the country.
Two text journalists accompanying U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks were given access to the U.S- and British-led weapons transfer center for the first time on Tuesday.
The room, which operates 24 hours a day and holds about 100 military personnel from two dozen countries, is lined with television monitors attached to the ceiling, with small teams working on different parts of the mammoth operation to move weapons into Europe and eventually into Ukrainian hands.
The United States alone has rushed $3.9 billion worth of armaments to Ukraine since Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion. Earlier this month, President Joe Biden signed a bill to send $40 billion in additional military, economic and humanitarian aid to Kyiv.
None of the weapons are physically located at Patch Barracks in Stuttgart; the room acts as a logistics hub for coordinating the flow of weapons.
One group of soldiers, sitting next to British, American and Ukrainian flags, is responsible for intelligence on Russia’s operations in Ukraine.
Another group sitting close by a “Secret” sign on the wall tracks weapons and nonlethal aid moving into and around Europe from more than 40 countries.
Other troops log onto a newly created computer system that allows Ukrainian forces to put in requests for weapons.
In a sign of how the United States and its allies are preparing for the conflict to continue well into the future, a new team was recently created to try to anticipate Ukraine’s future needs.
Fewer than five Ukrainian service members work in the center as liaisons, said a U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“(It) probably began as simple deconfliction, but now I think really in terms of optimizing the capability that the international community can bring to bear,” Hicks told the reporters after visiting the coordination room.
As it became evident in November that Russia was putting troops in place to potentially invade Ukraine, a senior U.S. defense official struggled to give Kyiv speedboats.
“(I) had to make 5,000 phone calls,” the official said. “Since then, it has become better organized.”
When the coordination center first began its work in March, British and U.S. officials said, it was relatively easy to move smaller weapons like Javelin anti-tank missiles.
As the war has progressed and the fighting has largely moved to eastern Ukraine, longer-range and heavier weapons like howitzer artillery systems have become the primary focus.
“It has become more complex. At first it was ‘give us anything,’ and now we’re more focused on the capabilities,” a British official said.
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За словами прем’єра Віктора Орбана, уряду потрібен простір для маневру, щоб швидко реагувати на виклики.
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Олександр Мотузяник заявив, що зараз спостерігається найактивніша фаза повномасштабної військової агресії Росії.
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Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba Tuesday urged other governments to send more weapons more quickly to aid Ukraine’s fight against Russian forces.
“Too early to conclude that Ukraine already has all the arms it needs,” Kuleba tweeted Tuesday. “Russian offensive in the Donbas is a ruthless battle, the largest one on European soil since WWII. I urge partners to speed up deliveries of weapons and ammunition, especially MLRS, long-range artillery, APCs.”
Britain’s defense ministry said Tuesday that Russian forces have increased the intensity of their operations in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine as they try to encircle multiple cities, including Severodonetsk.
“Russia’s capture of the Severodonetsk pocket would see the whole of Luhansk Oblast placed under Russian occupation. While currently Russia’s main effort, this operation is only one part of Russia’s campaign to seize the Donbas.”
Kuleba’s call for more military help came a day after U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said about 20 countries are sending new security assistance packages for Ukraine.
“Many countries are donating critically needed artillery ammunition, coastal defense systems, tanks and other armored vehicles. Others came forward with new commitments for training Ukraine’s forces and sustaining its military systems,” Austin told reporters at the Pentagon after concluding the second meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group.
Denmark said it would provide Ukrainian forces with a Harpoon launcher and missiles, while the Czech Republic donated attack helicopters, tanks and rocket systems.
Monday’s meeting included 47 nations that participated virtually, according to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Mark Milley, the top U.S. military officer. Austria, Colombia and Ireland were among the new participants.
The group’s next meeting will be held June 15 in Brussels.
“Everyone here understands the stakes of this war, and they stretch far beyond Europe,” Austin said.
U.S. President Joe Biden had a similar message Tuesday as he met with the leaders of Japan, India and Australia, telling the group that the conflict in Ukraine “is more than just a European issue, it’s a global issue.”
Citing the widespread effects of the conflict, including on the global food supply, Biden pledged ongoing U.S. support, saying, “as long as Russia continues the war, the United States will work with our partners to help be the global response, because it’s going to affect all parts of the world.”
Finland’s foreign minister, Pekka Haavisto, said Finland and Sweden are sending delegations to Ankara for talks with Turkish officials Wednesday about their applications to join the NATO military alliance.
Turkey has expressed opposition to the bids, accusing Sweden and Finland of harboring people linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group and followers of U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Turkey says orchestrated a 2016 coup attempt.
Any new NATO members must be approved by all of the alliance’s current member states.
“We understand that Turkey has some of their own security concerns vis-a-vis terrorism … We think that these issues can be settled,” Haavisto said at the World Economic Forum in Davos. “There might be also some issues that are not linked directly to Finland and Sweden but more to other NATO members.”
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, also speaking Tuesday in Davos, said he is confident the concerns of all allies will be addressed and that Finland and Sweden will be welcomed into the alliance.
“Finland and Sweden’s decision to apply for NATO membership is historic,” Stoltenberg said. “It demonstrates that European security will not be dictated by violence and intimidation. All allies agree that NATO enlargement has been a great success, spreading freedom and democracy across Europe.”
The NATO leader highlighted demands made by Russian President Vladimir Putin before the invasion, including a guarantee that NATO would not expand.
“He wanted less NATO on his borders and launched a war. Now he’s getting more NATO on his borders and more members,” Stoltenberg said.
Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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Вселенський патріархат 9 травня визнав Охридську архієпископію в Північній Македонії.
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Під час цієї зустрічі близько 20 країн запропонували нові пакети військової допомоги Україні в боротьбі з російськими загарбниками
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A Moscow court has upheld a nine-year prison term for opposition politician Alexey Navalny, who is already behind bars for a previous conviction he and his supporters have called politically motivated.
Navalny took part in the Tuesday hearing via a video link from a prison in the Vladimir region.
The Kremlin critic used his final statement in court to condemn the Russian authorities for launching the ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and reiterated his previous statements that all of the charges against him are politically motivated.
Navalny was handed the sentence on March 22 after the court found him guilty of embezzlement and contempt charges that he and his supporters have repeatedly rejected as politically motivated.
Navalny was arrested in January last year upon his arrival to Moscow from Germany, where he was treated for a poison attack with what European labs defined as a Soviet-style nerve agent.
He was then handed a 2 1/2-year prison sentence for violating the terms of an earlier parole because of his convalescence abroad. The original conviction is widely regarded as a trumped-up, politically motivated case.
Navalny has blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for his poisoning with a Novichok-style chemical substance. The Kremlin has denied any role in the attack.
International organizations consider Navalny a political prisoner.
The European Union, U.S. President Joe Biden, and other international officials have demanded Russia release the 45-year-old Kremlin-critic.
Navalny is currently serving his term in a prison in the town of Pokrov, some 200 kilometers east of Moscow. He is expected to be transferred to a stricter regime prison for the new conviction.
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За словами голови МЗС, особливо потрібні реактивні системи залпового вогню, далекобійну артилерію та бронетранспортери
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Виконувач обов’язків генпрокурора Молдови Думітру Робу заявив, що Додона затримали на 72 години
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Івана Малєєва вже викрадали в квітні, після того, як той відхилив ультиматум про співпрацю
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For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.
The latest developments in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. All times EDT:
4:30 a.m.: Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba urged other governments to send more weapons more quickly to aid Ukraine’s fight against Russian forces.
4:00 a.m.: U.S. President Joe Biden met with the leaders of Japan, India and Australia, Tuesday and said the conflict in Ukraine “is more than just a European issue, it’s a global issue.”
Citing the widespread effects of the conflict, including on the global food supply, Biden pledged ongoing U.S. support, saying, “as long as Russia continues the war, the United States will work with our partners to help be the global response, because it’s going to affect all parts of the world.”
Biden said the conflict in Ukraine demonstrates the importance of international order, adding that, “international law, human rights must always be defended regardless of where they’re violated in the world.”
3:30 a.m.: Russian gas producer Gazprom GAZP.MM said it continues to supply gas to Europe through Ukraine via the Sudzha entry point, with volumes on Tuesday seen at 46.1 million cubic meters (mcm), up from 43 mcm on Monday, Reuters reported.
An application to supply gas via the main Sokhranovka entry point was rejected by Ukraine, Gazprom said. However, Ukraine’s state gas transit operator says Gazprom has reduced booked transit capacity for May 24 to 44.96 million cubic meters from 66.26 mcm booked earlier, Reuters said.
2:30 a.m.: Britain is in discussions with Ukraine about how to help get grain out of the country after Russia blocked its main sea ports, transport minister Grant Shapps said on Tuesday, Reuters reported.
Shapps said he was very concerned about the issue, which has seen global food prices soar as Ukraine is unable to export nearly 25 million tons of grains, and met Ukrainian Infrastructure Minister Oleksander Kubrakov last week. “We were discussing details which I can’t go into but about how infrastructure could be in place to ensure the grain leaves,” Shapps told Sky News.
“We’re looking at all the different options … there are lots of different potential ways to get grain and other goods out of the country,” he said. “It’s absolutely essential that we do, otherwise there could be a lot of hunger and indeed even famine.”
1:40 a.m.: Australia’s Prime Minister Antony Albanese said on Tuesday “strong views” were expressed on Russia in the Quad leaders meeting, Reuters reported.
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Albanese said Russia’s “unilateral” attack on the people of Ukraine was an outrage. “Strong views were expressed in the meeting,” he added. “That was obviously discussed you will see the reference in the leaders’ statement,” Australia’s foreign affairs minister Penny Wong said.
Asked about U.S. President Joe Biden’s comments this week on Taiwan, Albanese said there was “no change” in Australia’s position on Taiwan. “There should be no unilateral change to the status quo,” he said.
Australia’s new prime minister was sworn in Monday before flying to Japan for talks with U.S. President Joe Biden and other world leaders. For VOA, Phil Mercer has the story.
1:10 a.m.: The British defense ministry said Tuesday that Russia has increased intensity of operations in Donbas as it seeks to encircle Severodonetsk, Lyschansk, and Rubizhne. “At present the northern and southern axes of this operation are separated by approximately 25 km of Ukrainian-held territory,” the ministry said in a daily report posted on Twitter.
1:00 a.m.: As Ukraine marks three months since the start of the Russian invasion, residents in the capital of Kyiv have commemorated those who have been lost since the start of the conflict, The Associated Press reported.
A lawn in a square in the capital has been strewn with small Ukrainian flags, put out in tribute to those who have lost their lives since the fighting broke out on February 24. A monument displays the message “Ukrainians killed by (Russian President Vladimir) Putin” with the number 7,463 written below.
Also in Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy took part in a ceremony to launch a series of anti-war postage stamps.
The first stamp depicts the sinking of a Russian warship in April. The stamps were put into circulation by the Ukrainian Post; there will be 5 million in all.
12:35 a.m.: Russian forces are stepping up their offensive on the last pocket of resistance around Lugansk in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, Agence France-Presse reported.
12:30 a.m.: Analyst APK-Inform, an information and analytical agency, raised its forecasts for Ukraine’s 2022/23 grain crop and exports because of a better-than-expected winter harvest on Tuesday, Reuters reported.
Ukraine could harvest 48.3 million tons of grain in 2022, including almost 17.1 million tons of wheat and 25.2 million tons of corn, the consultancy agency said in a statement.
APK-Inform said 2022/23 exports could also rise to 39.4 million tons versus the previous outlook of 33.2 million tons.
The agency however revised down its forecast for Ukraine’s sunflower oil output by around 7% to 5.3 million tons despite the unchanged outlook of the 2022 sunflower harvest at 9.2 million tons. Ukraine harvested 16.6 million tons of sunflower seeds last year.
Ukraine is the world’s largest sunflower seed grower and sunflower oil exporter, but its invasion by Russia in February and the heavy fighting since have clouded the outlook for planting and exports.
12:15 a.m.: About 20 countries are sending new security assistance packages for Ukraine, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said after concluding the second meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group.
“Many countries are donating critically needed artillery ammunition, coastal defense systems, tanks and other armored vehicles. Others came forward with new commitments for training Ukraine’s forces and sustaining its military systems,” Austin told reporters at the Pentagon Monday. VOA’s Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb has the story.
12:01 a.m.: Through photos, videos, charts, and analysis, The Guardian documents “Russia’s use of illegal weapons” during the invasion of Ukraine.
“The Guardian has visited the small towns and villages north of Kyiv razed to the ground during the Russian occupation and reviewed evidence found there — as well as other materials from Ukrainian prosecutors — of imprecise munitions such as the FAB-250, metal dart shells and cluster bombs whose use led to the deaths of hundreds of civilians.”
Some information in this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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За словами Габека, Європейська комісія та США співпрацюють над пропозиціями, які дозволять обмежити світові ціни на нафту
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Turkey is vowing to crush the presence of the Kurdish militant group PKK in Iraq. The PKK has used neighboring Iraq as the main base in its war for greater minority rights in Turkey. But as the Turkish military closes in on the PKK, analysts warn that the Kurdish group could turn to Iran, with implications across the region, including US forces in Syria. Dorian Jones reports for VOA from Istanbul.
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At his swearing-in ceremony, new Education Minister Pap Ndiaye paid tribute to the nation’s teachers, singling out Samuel Paty, killed by an Islamist extremist in 2020.
Ndiaye described himself as a symbol of meritocracy and diversity. Rather than feeling proud, he said, he assumed his new job with a sense of duty and responsibility.
The 57-year-old Ndiaye is a longtime university professor and expert on the history of minorities and rights movements in both France and the United States. Last year, he was tapped to head France’s National Museum of the History of Immigration.
“It was unexpected, obviously, but it was very good news.”
Louis-Georges Tin is a Black rights activist and former head of the Representative Council of Black Associations, or CRAN. He salutes the new education minister.
“He’s a brilliant person,” Tin said. “He’s respected in the academy. He’s done quite a few actions in terms also of the fight against racism in the country.”
While Tin is not alone in praising Ndiaye’s appointment, some right-wing politicians are criticizing it.
Far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who came second in last month’s presidential vote, described Ndiaye’s designation as an alarming signal for the future. She called him a defender of so-called “racialism” and woke-ism, which critics deride as a leftist protest ideology. Other critics describe Ndiaye as anti-police.
Interviewed on French radio, Ndiaye’s sister, award-winning author Marie Ndiaye, said she wasn’t surprised at the criticism — but called it absurd and stupid.
Some observers say the controversy over Ndiaye’s appointment reflects simmering discrimination in France, as the 2020 death of African-American George Floyd in police custody in the United States ignited similar Black rights protests here.
In interviews over the years, Pap Ndiaye has said France is reluctant to fully examine its history of colonialism and slavery. He has praised French police but also said police violence should be discussed.
Activist Louis-Georges Tin said much more needs to be done in teaching French students about discrimination. Tin said he fears Ndiaye’s efforts to change things during his tenure will result in pushback.
“Having a Black minister in France is not new,” Tin said. “And having racist attacks is not new either. It’s always the same story … so that’s why we are in a situation of state racism, systemic racism. People don’t want Black ministers in this country.”
Ndiaye is certainly different from his predecessor, Jean-Michel Blanquer, who criticized both the “Black Lives Matter” movement and so-called woke culture. Education unions, which clashed with Blanquer, have reacted positively to the country’s new education chief.
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Facebook parent Meta said it will start publicly providing more details about how advertisers target people with political ads just months ahead of the U.S. midterm elections.
The announcement follows years of criticism that the social media platforms withhold too much information about how campaigns, special interest groups and politicians use the platform to target small pockets of people with polarizing, divisive or misleading messages.
Meta, which also owns Instagram, said it will start releasing details in July about the demographics and interests of audiences who are targeted with ads that run on its two primary social networks. The company will also share how much advertisers spent in an effort to target people in certain states.
“By making advertiser targeting criteria available for analysis and reporting on ads run about social issues, elections and politics, we hope to help people better understand the practices used to reach potential voters on our technologies,” Jeff King wrote in a statement posted to Meta’s website.
The new details could shed more light on how politicians spread misleading or controversial political messages among certain groups of people. Advocacy groups and Democrats, for example, have argued for years that misleading political ads are overwhelming the Facebook feeds of Spanish-speaking populations.
The information will be showcased in the Facebook ad library, a public database that already shows how much companies, politicians or campaigns spend on each ad they run across Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp. Currently, anyone can see how much a page has spent running an ad and a breakdown of the ages, gender and states or countries an ad is shown in.
The information will be available across 242 countries when a social issue, political or election ad is run, Meta said in a statement.
Meta collected $86 billion in revenue during 2020, the last major U.S. election year, thanks in part to its granular ad targeting system. Facebook’s ad system is so customizable that advertisers could target a single user out of billions on the platform, if they wanted.
Meta said in its announcement Monday that it will provide researchers with new details that show the interest categories advertisers selected when they tried to target people on the platform.
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За словами Джо Байдена, необхідність захисту Тайваню стала «ще сильнішою» після масштабного вторгнення Росії в Україну
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Основними заходами для боротьби зі спалахом є відстеження контактів та ізоляція, вважають в організації
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«Не сприймаю будь-яку зустріч з будь-ким у РФ, окрім як з президентом, і в тому випадку, якщо на столі буде одне питання – припинення війни. Все. Про інше нема про що говорити»
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A veteran Russian diplomat to the United Nations office in Geneva resigned Monday because he said he was “so ashamed” of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine three months ago.
In a rare, but not unprecedented protest within the Russian diplomatic corps, Boris Bondarev, 41, handed in his resignation in a letter addressed to Ambassador Gennady Gatilov and then released a scathing denunciation of the Russian war effort.
“The aggressive war unleashed by Putin against Ukraine, and in fact against the entire Western world, is not only a crime against the Ukrainian people,” Bondarev said, “but also perhaps the most serious crime against the people of Russia, with a bold letter Z (signifying support for the war) crossing out all hopes and prospects for a prosperous free society in our country.”
Bondarev, who has focused on Russian disarmament issues in Geneva, contended “that those who conceived this war want only one thing — to remain in power forever, live in pompous tasteless palaces, sail in yachts comparable in tonnage and costs to the entire Russian navy, enjoying unlimited power and complete impunity.”
“To achieve that, Bondarev said, “they are willing to sacrifice as many lives as it takes. Thousands of Russians and Ukrainians have already died just for this.”
He said that during his 20 years as a Russian diplomat, including postings in Cambodia and Mongolia, “the level of lies and unprofessionalism in the Foreign Ministry has been increasing all the time.”
Bondarev attacked Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov as a “good illustration of the degradation of this system,” someone who had fallen from a “professional and educated intellectual” held in “high esteem” by his diplomatic colleagues to “a person who constantly broadcasts conflicting statements and threatens the world (that is, Russia too) with nuclear weapons!”
“Russia no longer has allies,” he concluded, “and there is no one to blame but its reckless and ill-conceived policy. …. I cannot any longer share in this bloody, witless and absolutely needless ignominy.”
Almost as an aside, he added, “Job offers are welcome.”
Bondarev told The Associated Press he had not received any reaction yet from Russian officials, but added, “Am I concerned about the possible reaction from Moscow? I have to be concerned about it.”
Asked if some colleagues felt the same, he added, “Not all Russian diplomats are warmongering. They are reasonable, but they have to keep their mouths shut.”
Russia has cracked down on protests against the Ukraine invasion, arresting street protesters, curbing media criticism and approving up to 15-year prison terms for those spreading “false information” about the invasion, including calling it a war instead of a “special military operation.”
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press.
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