Liza, a 4-year-old girl with Down syndrome, was en route to see a speech therapist with her mother in central Ukraine when a Russian missile hit.
She never made it to the appointment. Now the images that tell the story of her life and its end are touching hearts worldwide.
Wearing a blue denim jacket with flowers, Liza was among 23 people killed, including boys ages 7 and 8, in Thursday’s missile strike in Vinnytsia. Her mother, Iryna Dmytrieva, was among the scores injured.
After the explosion, the mother and daughter went in different directions. Iryna, 33, went into a hospital’s intensive care unit while Liza went to a morgue.
“She remembered that she was reaching for her daughter, and Liza was already dead,” Iryna’s aunt, Tetiana Dmytrysyna, told The Associated Press on Friday. “The mother was robbed of the most precious thing she had.”
Shortly before the explosion, Dmytrieva had posted a video on social media showing her daughter straining to reach the handlebars to push her own stroller, happily walking through Vinnytsia, wearing the denim jacket and white pants, her hair decorated with a barrette. Another video on social media showed the little girl twirling in a lavender dress in a field of lavender.
After the Russian missile strike, Ukraine’s emergency services shared photos showing her lifeless body on the ground next to her blood-stained stroller. The videos and photos have gone viral, the latest images and stories from the brutal war in Ukraine to horrify the world.
Olena Zelenska, wife of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, posted that she had met this “wonderful girl” while filming a Christmas video with a group of children who were given oversized ornaments to paint.
“The little mischievous girl then managed in a half an hour to paint not only herself, her holiday dress, but also all the other children, me, the cameramen and the director. … Look at her alive, please,” Zelenska wrote in a note accompanying the video.
When the war started, Dmytrieva and her family fled Kyiv, the capital, for Vinnytsia, a city 268 kilometers to the southwest. Until Thursday, Vinnytsia was considered relatively safe.
Dmytrieva gave birth to her only daughter when she was 29. The girl was born with a heart defect, but doctors saved her. She also had Down syndrome.
“Liza was a sunny baby,” her great aunt recalled. “They say that these children do not understand or know how to do everything. But this is not true. She was a very bright child. She knew how to draw, spoke, always helped adults and always smiled. Always cheerful.”
For her mother, Liza was the greatest gift of her life.
“She loved her infinitely,” said her great aunt.
The explosion site is now cordoned off. People come to leave flowers, candles and teddy bears. Another item at a makeshift shrine is a page from a children’s lesson book. Among the mourners are mothers deeply touched by the story of Iryna and Liza Dmytrieva.
“Innocent children die,” said Kateryna Kondratyuk, bursting into tears at the explosion scene.
Meanwhile, Iryna is conscious and in intensive care.
“She is a fighter. She will get out. We are all praying for her,” her aunt said.
Liza’s father was at the morgue Friday, completing the paperwork to receive his daughter’s body for burial.
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Here is a fast take on what the international community has been up to this past week, as seen from the United Nations perch.
‘Broad agreement’ on deal to export blockaded Ukrainian grain
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Wednesday there is “broad agreement” on a deal between Russia and Ukraine, with Turkey and the United Nations, to export millions of tons of Ukrainian grain stuck in silos since Russia’s invasion on February 24. Breaking his silence to speak to reporters at U.N. headquarters, Guterres said important and substantive progress had been made and the parties are getting closer to a comprehensive agreement.
UN Chief Cites ‘Broad Agreement’ on Ukrainian Grain Exports
Cross-border aid operation into Syrian renewed for six months
On Tuesday, after days of difficult negotiations, the U.N. Security Council renewed for an initial six months the mechanism that allows humanitarians to bring about 800 aid trucks a month from Turkey into opposition-controlled areas of northwest Syria. More than 4.1 million Syrians depend on that assistance, but they will face the possibility of losing it in the dead of winter, when, at the insistence of Russia, the council will have to vote again to extend it.
UN Aid Operation to NW Syria Gets 6-Month Extension
Thousands of children maimed, raped or killed in conflicts last year
The United Nations said Monday that thousands of children in war zones suffered grave abuses last year, including rape, severe injuries and death, and that concerns are growing for children in new regions of conflict, including Ukraine. The secretary-general’s report on children in armed conflict verified nearly 24,000 grave violations against children. More than 8,000 were killed or maimed because of conflict; 6,310 were recruited and used in combat; and nearly 3,500 children were abducted, among other violations.
UN: Thousands of Children Suffer Grave Abuses in War Zones
Gang violence driving more Haitians into poverty and hunger
The World Food Program said Tuesday that nearly half of Haiti’s 11.4 million people are facing hunger because of gang violence and soaring food costs. The violence has killed scores of people and made it more dangerous and difficult for farmers to get produce to the country’s markets. Humanitarians are also having to move food by sea and air to parts of the island nation that are too dangerous to reach by road, making aid more expensive and harder to distribute. The Security Council is due to vote late Friday on a proposed resolution that includes a ban on small arms to Haitian gangs and threatens them with sanctions if they do not end the violence. The U.N. says at least 99 people have been killed in recent days.
Gang Violence, Rising Prices, Send Food Shortages in Haiti Spiraling Out of Control
World’s population projected to be 8 billion by November
The United Nations projected this week that the global population will hit 8 billion people by November, and that it will gradually increase to 8.5 billion by 2050, and to more than 10 billion by 2080. That growth will come with significant economic and environmental implications. India is soon expected to overtake China as the most populated nation on Earth.
Continued Global Population Growth Creates Challenges, Opportunities
In brief
— Guterres urged leaders in Sri Lanka to embrace a compromise for a peaceful democratic transition, as that country experiences a political and economic crisis that saw President Gotabaya Rajapaksa resign and flee the country this week. Guterres said it is important that the root causes of the conflict and protesters’ grievances be addressed. The U.N. says humanitarian needs are on the rise, with nearly 5.7 million people in need of assistance.
— Following the deaths of seven of its peacekeepers in Mali this year, Egypt is suspending its participation in the stabilization mission known as MINUSMA, as of August 15. Egypt is one of the largest contributors of troops and police to the mission, with 1,039 personnel. Most recently, on June 28, two Egyptian peacekeepers were killed in northern Mali and nine others were wounded when their convoy hit an improvised explosive device.
— The U.N. refugee agency said Wednesday that nearly two-thirds of refugees who fled Ukraine since Russia launched its invasion in late February plan to stay in their host country in the coming months. That compares with 16% who said they plan to return to Ukraine. Another 9% said they would go to another host country, while 10% were uncertain. Refugees said their most urgent needs are cash, jobs and housing. UNHCR estimates that at the end of June there were at least 5.5 million Ukrainian refugees in Europe, with another 7.1 million people displaced within Ukraine.
— The World Health Organization and the U.N. Children’s Fund, UNICEF, said Friday that 25 million children missed out on one or more doses of routine vaccinations last year. The report attributed the decline to factors including increased misinformation about vaccines and COVID-19-related disruptions. UNICEF said it is the largest sustained disruption in 30 years and the consequences could be deadly for many children.
Good news
Botswana is set to become the first country in Africa to achieve the 95-95-95 target of diagnosing 95% of HIV-positive individuals, providing them antiretroviral therapy and achieving viral suppression. The southern African nation is eight years ahead of the 2030 target date. The U.N. says a recent survey found 93% of people living with HIV in Botswana are aware of their status and 97.9% of them are receiving antiretroviral therapy. Of that group, 98% have achieved viral load suppression to reduce the amount of HIV to an undetectable level, which also helps prevent transmission.
Quote of note
“In a world darkened by global crises, today, at last, we have a ray of hope.”
— Guterres on Wednesday, welcoming news from Istanbul that a deal is nearing completion on exporting Ukrainian grain that Russia has blocked in the southern Ukrainian port of Odesa.
Next week
Monday, the U.N. will commemorate Nelson Mandela’s birthday. Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, will deliver the keynote address in the General Assembly. He will be accompanied by his wife, Meghan Markle. The day is also marked with community service to honor the late South African leader. On what would have been Madiba’s 104th birthday, U.N. participants will do their good works at the Thomas Jefferson Park in New York’s neighborhood of East Harlem.
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«Обсяг і частота невибіркових атак на цивільних мешканців та цивільні об’єкти є достовірним доказом того, що бойові дії велися з порушенням міжнародного гуманітарного права»
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«Ми розуміємо зниження безпековості регіону, зниження безпековості нашої оборони. Воно взагалі не те, що не стоїть на порядку денному, а взагалі не може обговорюватися»
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«Це реально, якщо наші партнери будуть продовжувати нам допомагати»
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Western finance ministers condemned Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine at G-20 talks in Indonesia on Friday, accusing Russian officials of complicity in atrocities committed during the war.
The two-day meeting on the island of Bali began under the shadow of a Russian military assault that has roiled markets, spiked food prices and stoked breakneck inflation, a week after Moscow’s top diplomat walked out of talks with the forum’s foreign ministers.
“Russia is solely responsible for negative spillovers to the global economy,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told the Russian delegation in the opening session, according to a Treasury official.
“Russia’s officials should recognize that they are adding to the horrific consequences of this war through their continued support of the Putin regime. You share responsibility for the innocent lives lost.”
She was joined by Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who told Russia’s delegation they were responsible for “war crimes” in Ukraine because of their support for the invasion, a Canadian official said.
“It is not only generals who commit war crimes, it is the economic technocrats who allow the war to happen and to continue,” said Freeland, according to the official.
Both Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov and Ukrainian Finance Minister Serhiy Marchenko are participating virtually in the meeting.
Moscow instead sent Russian Deputy Finance Minister Timur Maksimov to attend the talks in person. He was present for both Yellen and Freeland’s condemnation, according to a source present at the talks.
Host and G-20 chair Indonesia warned ministers that failure to tackle energy and food crises would be catastrophic.
In her opening remarks, Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati called on ministers to work together with a spirit of “cooperation” because “the world is watching” for solutions.
“The cost of our failure is more than we can afford,” she told delegates. “The humanitarian consequences for the world and for many low-income countries would be catastrophic.”
No walkout
The meeting has largely focused on the food and energy crises that are weighing on an already brittle global recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“(Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s actions including the destruction of agricultural facilities, theft of grain and farm equipment, and effective blockade of Black Sea ports amounts to using food as a weapon of war,” Yellen said in an afternoon seminar.
Indrawati said members had “identified the urgent need for the G-20 to take concrete steps” to address food insecurity and to help countries in need.
Yellen is also pressing G-20 allies for a price cap on Russian oil to choke off Putin’s war chest and pressure Moscow to end its invasion while bringing down energy costs.
Yellen in April led a multinational walkout of finance officials as Russian delegates spoke at a G-20 meeting in Washington, but there was no such action Friday.
There is unlikely to be a final communique issued when talks end on Saturday because of disagreements with Russia.
‘Act together’
G-20 chair Indonesia — which pursues a neutral foreign policy — has refrained from uninviting Russia despite Western pressure.
“We need to act together to demonstrate why G-20 deserves its reputation as the premier forum for international cooperation,” Indrawati said.
Alongside Moscow and Kyiv’s ministers, Chinese Finance Minister Liu Kun and Britain’s new Finance Minister Nadhim Zahawi were only attending virtually.
International Monetary Fund chief Kristalina Georgieva will appear in person after saying Wednesday the global economic outlook had “darkened significantly” because of Moscow’s invasion.
European Central Bank president Christine Lagarde is participating virtually, but World Bank Chief Executive David Malpass will not attend.
The meeting is a prelude to the leaders’ summit on the Indonesian island in November that was meant to focus on the global recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Other issues being tackled by the ministers included digital financial inclusion — with more than a billion of the world’s population still without access to a bank account — and the deadline for an international tax rules overhaul.
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“The simple truth is that, as we speak, children, women and men, the young and the old, are living in terror,” International Criminal Court Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan said at the opening of the Ukraine Accountability Conference in The Hague on Thursday, with about 40 nations in attendance.
Khan said an “overarching strategy” is needed to bring those guilty of conducting war crimes in Ukraine to justice.
Ukraine has granted the ICC jurisdiction over the crimes committed within the country, opening the door to the court’s investigations, since neither Ukraine nor Russia is an ICC member.
Ukrainian officials said Russian missiles struck the central Ukrainian city of Vinnytsia on Thursday, killing at least 23 people and wounding more than 100 others.
Police said three missiles hit an office building in the center of the city, located about 270 kilometers southwest of the capital, Kyiv. The strikes, coming from a Russian submarine in the Black Sea, damaged residential buildings in the area and engulfed 50 cars in a nearby parking lot.
“This is the act of Russian terror,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the ICC meeting in a video address.
The governor of the Vinnytsia region, Serhiy Borzov, said Ukrainian air defense systems shot down another four missiles over the area.
With a population of 370,000, Vinnytsia is one of Ukraine’s largest cities. Thousands of people from eastern Ukraine, where Russia has concentrated its offensive, have fled there since the start of the war in late February.
President Zelenskyy said the dead included a child.
“Every day Russia is destroying the civilian population, killing Ukrainian children, directing missiles at civilian objects where there is no military (target). What is it if not an open act of terrorism?” Zelenskyy wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
Russia has denied targeting civilians in Ukraine.
Warfare continues to rage in eastern Ukraine, but the British Defense Ministry said Thursday that despite continued shelling, Russian forces have not made major territorial gains in recent days.
“The aging vehicles, weapons and Soviet-era tactics used by Russian forces do not lend themselves to quickly regaining or building momentum unless used in overwhelming mass — which Russia is currently unable to bring to bear,” the British ministry said.
Grain exports
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Wednesday there is “broad agreement” on a deal between Russia and Ukraine, with Turkey and the United Nations, to export millions of tons of Ukrainian grain stuck in silos since Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24.
“Today is an important and substantive step,” Guterres told reporters of developments at talks in Istanbul among the four parties. “A step on the way to a comprehensive agreement.”
The U.N. chief broke his public silence on the negotiations, pointing to a statement from Turkey’s defense minister, who said there is agreement on major points, including the creation of a coordination center with Russia, Ukraine and the U.N.; agreement on controls for checking grain at ports; and ensuring the safety of cargo ships carrying the grain out of Odesa.
“Of course, this was a first meeting,” Guterres noted. “The progress was extremely encouraging. Now, the delegations are coming back to their capitals, and we hope the next steps will allow us to come to a formal agreement.”
While Guterres would not speculate about when the final agreement would be ready, he said he hoped the parties would reconvene next week and have a final agreement. Whenever it is, he said, he would be ready to go to Istanbul to sign it.
A U.N. official with knowledge of the talks said there was an important meeting of the Russians and the Ukrainians where they were able to make a lot of progress on sticking points.
More than 20 million tons of Ukrainian grain are being stored in silos at the Black Sea port of Odesa, and dozens of ships have been stranded because of Russia’s blockade. Turkey said it has 20 merchant ships waiting in the region that could be quickly loaded and dispatched to world markets.
The grain deal has been in the works for months, with U.N. officials raising the alarm nearly immediately after the war started about the consequences for global food security if Ukraine, which is one of the world’s top grain exporters, is unable to get its harvests out.
“Truly, failure to open those ports in Odesa region will be a declaration of war on global food security,” World Food Program chief David Beasley warned at a meeting of the U.N. Security Council on May 19. “And it will result in famine and destabilization and mass migration around the world.”
WFP says 276 million people worldwide were facing acute hunger at the start of this year. They project that number will rise by 47 million people if the conflict in Ukraine continues, with the steepest increases in sub-Saharan Africa.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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«Поки що ми не пробили цей момент. Але я переконаний, нам і це вдасться»
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Сам Євген Кисельов наразі не коментував рішення РФ про оголошення його у розшук
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13 липня завершився пільговий період, протягом якого країна мала виплатити 22,9 мільйона доларів за єврооблігаціями Belarus-27
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США надали близько 7 мільярдів доларів допомоги Україні з початку широкомасштабного вторгнення Росії 24 лютого
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Нині у лікарнях 73 постраждалих від російського ракетного обстрілу, 18 людей вважаються зниклими безвісти
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An Azerbaijani journalist imprisoned on what rights groups believe are trumped-up charges has had his appeal for parole rejected.
The Supreme Court of Azerbaijan on Wednesday rejected the appeal of human rights defender and journalist Elchin Mammad to be freed after serving one-third of his sentence.
Mammad, editor of the news website Yukselish Namine and head of the nongovernmental organization Legal Education of Sumgayit Youth, was arrested in the city of Sumgayit in 2020.
Police at the time said they’d found stolen jewelry in his office. A court in October 2020 convicted Mammad of theft and illegal possession of weapons, and it sentenced him to four years in prison.
Mammad denies the allegations, and journalists and human rights defenders say they believe his imprisonment is arbitrary.
Accusations ‘do not seem credible’
Farid Gahramanov, who works for the independent Turan news agency, told VOA he believed the case against Mammad was political.
“As a journalist and social activist, Elchin Mammad was engaged in protecting human rights and freedom of expression. We can say that he was arrested precisely for this reason, because the accusations made against him do not seem credible and have not been proven in court,” he told VOA.
Mammad’s website publishes content on human rights, freedom of speech and access to information. And his nongovernmental organization provides legal assistance to low-income families.
Amnesty International reported at the time that the journalist’s arrest came a few days after he published a report on human rights abuses in Azerbaijan.
According to Amnesty, the journalist said he believed police had planted the stolen goods in his office when it was searched in his absence.
Mushfiq Alasgarli, deputy chair of Azerbaijan’s Press Council, denied that Mammad’s arrest was related to journalistic activities.
The self-regulatory Press Council says on its website that it oversees media compliance with legal and professional requirements and works to strengthen relations between the state, public and press.
“Even though whenever some people are jailed, it is assumed that it’s in connection with their occupation, that is not the case with Elchin Mammad. The charges against him are directly related to illegal possession of weapons and theft,” Alasgarli told VOA.
Problem for the nation
Alasgarli said, however, that he believed detaining such people “creates a problem not only for Elchin Mammad, but also for Azerbaijan as a whole. International organizations report these cases. These facts are used against Azerbaijan.”
The deputy chair said that in some cases it could be more effective to free such prisoners.
The Azerbaijan Supreme Court did not respond to multiple calls from VOA requesting comment.
Under Azerbaijan’s penal code, parole can be offered to people who have served a third of their sentences, provided they complied with prison regulations, Fuad Ahmadli, coordinator of the Center for the Protection of Political Prisoners and Victims of Torture, told VOA.
In October 2021, a district court denied Mammad’s request to release for parole, arguing that although the journalist had not violated any prison rules, he had not pleaded guilty to the charges brought against him.
The Baku Court of Appeals upheld that decision in December 2021.
An affidavit presented to the court from the penal colony where Mammad is held stated that he “does not show sincerity in following relevant norms of behavior, ethical rules, communication with staff and other prisoners.”
Detention ‘absurd’
Mammad’s lawyer, Fariz Namazli, told VOA the journalist had followed prison rules and that no disciplinary action was taken against him.
“Moreover, his mother is 68 years old and seriously ill. Two young children of the human rights defender have been left without their father’s care,” Namazli said.
“The detention of Elchin Mammad and the denials by the district, appeal and supreme courts are absurd,” rights activist Ahmadli said.
He told VOA that it is illegal for the court to keep someone in prison for “absurd considerations such as his negative attitude towards labor, being introverted and not keeping his bed neat.”
Mammad himself told the court that the affidavit from the penal colony “does not reflect the reality.”
The journalist said he believes it was prepared to fulfill the will of the people who ordered his arrest and that they want to keep him in prison for as long as possible.
Turan journalist Gahramanov said cases like Mammad’s hurt the already restrictive media environment in the country. Azerbaijan has a poor press freedom record, ranking 154th out of 180 countries on the World Press Freedom Index, where 1 has the best conditions.
“Such severe punishment of journalists has a negative impact on freedom of expression in the country and serves to create self-censorship among journalists,” Gahramanov said.
Amnesty International and other international organizations have condemned Mammad’s conviction. Local human rights defenders recognize him as a political prisoner.
This story originated in VOA’s Azerbaijani Service.
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The United States is pressing to implement a plan meant to force Russia to sell oil at artificially low prices on the global market, in order to deprive the Kremlin of funding for its war in Ukraine.
Speaking at a news conference in Bali, Indonesia, before the start of a meeting of the finance ministers of the G-20 large economies, Yellen restated the Biden administration’s condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She said that cutting its profits from crude oil sales “would deny [Russian President Vladimir] Putin the revenue his war machine needs.”
She also argued that capping the price of Russian oil would further one of the administration’s major domestic aims: reducing inflation.
“A price cap on Russian oil is one of our most powerful tools to address the pain that Americans and families across the world are feeling at the gas pump and the grocery store right now,” she said.
However, the price cap plan relies on a complicated mechanism that has never been tried before, and some experts in global energy markets have said they believe it will not work.
Cap tied to sanctions
The plan that Yellen is proposing is tied to a new set of financial sanctions that the European Union, United Kingdom and the U.S. are preparing to impose on Russia.
In order to bring its crude oil to market, Russia relies on various transactions with international lenders, shipping firms and insurance companies. The current plan is to cut Russia off from those services beginning late this year. In theory, this would make it practically impossible for it to export any oil at all in the near term, and much more difficult in the future.
If fully implemented and successful, the results of the sanctions could be bad for everyone. Russia would lose its oil revenues, and the rest of the world would experience potentially devastating price increases because of the supply shock created by abruptly removing Russian crude from the market.
What Yellen and the Biden administration are proposing is an “exception” to the ban. If Russia agrees to sell its oil at a price that is under a certain cap — the level of which is to be determined by the countries imposing the sanctions — it will be allowed access to the services it needs to bring the oil to market.
This would avoid a global supply shock while simultaneously reducing Russia’s oil revenues.
Experts dubious
People deeply familiar with global oil markets say that they don’t believe the price cap plan will work.
Julian Lee, an oil strategist for Bloomberg First Word, wrote in an analysis published by The Washington Post that the scheme “stands very little chance of actually working.”
He wrote, “[Putin’s] calculation will almost certainly be that cutting off Russian oil exports will do more damage to the economies of buyers in Europe than it will to Russia. So it’s hopeless to expect him to acquiesce to a price cap imposed by the West.”
When VOA asked Edward C. Chow, a nonresident senior associate with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, if he believed the price cap plan was feasible, he provided a one-word answer.
“No,” he said.
Many workarounds
Chow, who has spent 45 years working in the international oil and gas business, including 20 years with oil giant Chevron, said, “I’ve canvassed every single energy expert I know. And not one person thinks it can work.”
He listed a series of potential workarounds, including alternative insurance arrangements, contracts that shift the risk of delivery to the seller rather than the buyer and the extensive use of Russia’s domestic tanker fleet — one of the world’s largest — that Moscow could use to get around the sanctions and avoid a price cap.
Chow, a former professor at Georgetown University, said that reading about the proposed price caps reminded him of teaching a graduate seminar on energy security.
“It struck me, when I first heard it, that it’s the kind of bright idea a group of grad students would come up with,” he said. “And professors love that, because it’s a great teaching moment to explain why this wouldn’t work as a practical matter, if you understand markets.”
Pressing forward
Doubts aside, the Biden administration appears to be intent on pressing forward.
The Treasury secretary said Thursday that the level at which the price cap would be set has not yet been determined, but that “we would want a number that clearly gives Russia incentive to continue to produce — that would make production profitable for Russia.”
If Russia refused to go along, she noted, it would suffer in the short term, as it failed to realize any revenue from oil that was ready for market. And it would also face long-term costs related to shutting down production and losing market share as oil buyers began to look elsewhere.
“I think from Russia’s point of view, a price cap or price exception to a policy that would otherwise be yet harsher on Russia is something that they should be willing to go along with,” Yellen said.
China and India
In the months since Russia invaded Ukraine and since Western countries became more reluctant to purchase Russian oil, China and India have stepped in to fill the gap, buying up to 1 million barrels per day, and accounting for as much as 20% of Russia’s exports.
Whether demand will remain high is an open question, especially in China, where there are signs the economy is slowing significantly. Also unclear is whether either or both of the two countries would abide by a cap on Russian oil prices.
Assuming that a price cap could be implemented, it would be a complex calculation. If Russia refused to sell oil below the rate at which the cap is set, China and India might continue purchasing its oil anyway but would have the leverage to demand a significant discount. At the same time, the removal of Russian oil from the broader market would drive up the price of the commodity around the world, including for China and India, which also buy oil from other producers.
If Russia does agree to sell oil under the price cap, China and India would have no incentive to pay anything above the capped rate.
“I’m hopeful that China and India will see that observing a price cap would serve their own interests in lowering the price that they pay for Russian oil,” Yellen said.
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A Russian arms dealer labeled the “Merchant of Death” who once inspired a Hollywood movie is back in the headlines with speculation around a return to Moscow in a prisoner exchange.
If Viktor Bout, 55, is indeed eventually freed in return for WNBA star Brittney Griner and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, as some published reports suggest, it would add to the lore around a charismatic arms dealer the U.S. has imprisoned for more than a decade.
Depending on the source, Bout is a swashbuckling businessman unjustly imprisoned after an overly aggressive U.S. sting operation, or a peddler of weapons whose sales fueled some of the world’s worst conflicts.
The 2005 Nicolas Cage movie, “Lord of War” was loosely based on Bout, a former Soviet air force officer who gained fame supposedly by supplying weapons for civil wars in South America, the Middle East and Africa. His clients were said to include Liberia’s Charles Taylor, longtime Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and both sides in Angola’s civil war.
Shira A. Scheindlin, the former New York City federal judge who sentenced Bout before returning to private law practice, can be counted among those who would not be disappointed by Bout’s freedom in a prisoner exchange.
“He’s done enough time for what he did in this case,” Scheindlin said in an interview, noting that Bout has served more than 11 years in U.S. prisons.
He was convicted in 2011 on terrorism charges. Prosecutors said he was ready to sell up to $20 million in weapons, including surface-to-air missiles to shoot down U.S. helicopters.
Bout has steadfastly proclaimed his innocence, saying he’s a legitimate businessman and didn’t sell weapons. He’s had plenty of support from high-level Russian officials since he was first arrested. A Russian parliament member testified when Bout was fighting extradition from Thailand to the U.S.
Last year, some of his paintings were displayed in Russia’s Civic Chamber, the body that oversees draft legislation and civil rights.
Bout’s case fits well into Moscow’s narrative that Washington is lying in wait to trap and oppress innocent Russians on flimsy grounds.
“From the resonant Bout case a real ‘hunt’ by Americans for Russian citizens around the world has unfolded,” the government newspaper Rossiiskaya Gazeta wrote last year.
Increasingly, Russia has cited his case as a human rights issue. His wife and lawyer claimed his health is deteriorating in the harsh prison environment where foreigners are not always eligible for the breaks that Americans might receive.
Last month, Russia’s human rights commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova said: “We very much hope that our compatriot Viktor Bout will return to his homeland.”
Moskalkova said the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the General Prosecutor’s Office and the Ministry of Justice were working to see if Bout might qualify for transfer to Russia to serve the rest of his sentence.
Now held in a medium-security facility in Marion, Illinois, Bout is scheduled to be released in August 2029.
“If you asked me today: ‘Do you think 10 years would be a fair sentence,’ I would say ‘yes,'” Scheindlin said.
“He got a hard deal,” the retired judge said, noting the U.S. sting operatives “put words in his mouth” so he’d say he was aware Americans could die from weapons he sold in order to require a terrorism enhancement that would force a long prison sentence, if not a life term.
“The idea of trading him shouldn’t be unacceptable to our government. It wouldn’t be wrong to release him,” Scheindlin said.
Still, she said an even exchange of Griner for Bout would be “troubling.”
The WNBA star and two-time Olympic gold medalist was arrested in February at a Moscow airport, where police said they found cannabis oil in a vape canister in her luggage. While the U.S. government has classified her as “wrongfully detained,” Griner pleaded guilty to drug possession charges on July 7 at her trial in a Russian court.
Scheindlin said Griner was arrested for something that “wouldn’t be five minutes in jail.”
That sentiment is shared by others. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch said in a July 9 editorial that Bout illegally trafficked billions of dollars of weapons “to feed wars around the world” and has “the blood of thousands on his hands,” while Griner “made a stupid mistake with a tiny amount of cannabis. She harmed no one.”
Griner could face up to 10 years in prison. Her guilty plea was not unanticipated by those who understand that similar moves commonly precede prisoner swaps. Whelan was arrested three years ago on espionage charges that the U.S. has said were trumped up and false.
In April 2012, Scheindlin imposed the mandatory minimum 25-year sentence that Bout now serves, but she said she did so only because it was required.
He was taken into custody at a Bangkok luxury hotel after conversations with the Drug Enforcement Administration sting operation’s informants who posed as officials of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, also known as the FARC. The group had been classified by Washington as a narco-terrorist group.
He was brought to the U.S. in November 2010.
The “Merchant of Death” moniker was attached to Bout by a high-ranking minister of Britain’s Foreign Office. The nickname was included in the U.S. government’s indictment of Bout.
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Приводом Драгі назвав відмову партії «Рух п’яти зірок» взяти участь у голосуванні в сенаті щодо довіри уряду
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Спікер закликав надіслати оригінал заяви про відставку до Шрі-Ланки найближчим доступним літаком із Сінгапуру
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«Загальна сума збитків вже перевищила 202 мільярди гривень, і це абсолютно не всі кейси»
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