Month: May 2022

As Russia’s Vladimir Putin defended his war in Ukraine Monday, a top European Union official visited Ukraine, while France floated a possible new political alliance for Kyiv and other EU hopefuls. It seemed like two different May 9ths Monday. In Moscow, a bellicose speech by Putin as Russia marked the Soviet Union’s defeat of Nazi Germany, 77 years ago. And in Strasbourg, France, the commemoration of Europe Day — and the foundation of the European Union, which has gained new attention with the war in Ukraine. Speaking before the European Parliament, President Emmanuel Macron of France — the EU’s current …

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U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed concern about the potential for Russia’s war in Ukraine to spread, during a visit to Moldova’s capital Monday.  “The impact of the war in Ukraine across the region and the world is profound and far-reaching; the consequences of escalation are too frightening to contemplate,” Guterres said during a joint news conference with Moldovan Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilita in Chisinau.   “I am deeply concerned about the continuation and possible spread of the war Russia is waging in Ukraine, and by the impact it is having not only in the region but around the world,” the U.N. …

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The U.S. on Monday suspended 232 tariffs on Ukrainian steel for a year, in a new attempt to boost the war-torn country’s economy.  “We can’t just admire the fortitude and spirit of the Ukrainian people — we need to have their backs and support one of the most important industries to Ukraine’s economic well-being,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said in announcing the tariff rollback.  “For steel mills to continue as an economic lifeline for the people of Ukraine, they must be able to export their steel,” she said.  But how much the tariff curb might help Ukraine’s economy was …

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Former French prime minister Francois Fillon will learn Monday whether an appeals court has upheld his conviction for setting his wife up with lucrative fake jobs. Revelations about the probe torpedoed conservative Fillon’s 2017 presidential campaign, leaving the way clear for centrist Emmanuel Macron — re-elected to a second term last month. The 68-year-old was convicted by a lower court in 2020 and sentenced to five years in jail, three of them suspended. At the November appeals hearing, prosecutors said there was clear evidence that Fillon and his stand-in as MP for the Sarthe department, Marc Joulaud, employed Fillon’s wife …

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The United States Department of the Treasury has announced new sanctions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. The department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has named entities and people that it says are critical to Russia’s ability to wage war, including the board members of two of Russia’s most important banks, a Russian state-owned bank and 10 of its subsidiaries, a state-supported weapons manufacturer, and three of Russia’s state-controlled television stations that generate revenue for the state, according to a department statement.   OFAC is also taking action to cut off access to services that are used by …

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Germany’s conservative CDU won an election in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein on Sunday, a boost to the party of former Chancellor Angela Merkel, which was ousted from the national government in federal elections last year. An exit poll by the political research group, Infratest dimap, put the Christian Democrats (CDU) at 43.5% of votes, up 11.5% from when Schleswig-Holstein last held a state election in 2017. Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s center-left Social Democrats, the main party in Germany’s “traffic light” coalition with the environmentalist Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP), meanwhile slumped to 15.9%, as it had presented a largely …

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The United States and other leading economies in the Group of Seven nations Sunday agreed to ban or phase out the purchase of Russian oil, directly targeting a major source of income for Moscow to pay for its 10-week invasion of Ukraine.   “This will hit hard at the main artery of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s economy and deny him the revenue he needs to fund his war,” the G-7 leaders from Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the U.S. said after a virtual meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.   The U.S. has already ended its purchase of …

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The U.K., U.S. and Irish governments have urged rival parties in Northern Ireland to come together to resurrect its power-sharing government after Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein scored a historic victory to become the biggest party in Northern Ireland’s Assembly. Sinn Fein, which seeks union with Ireland, won 27 seats in the 90-seat legislature, beating the Democratic Unionist Party, which secured 25 seats. It’s the first time in Northern Ireland’s history that an Irish nationalist party has topped the voting. But it’s not clear whether Sinn Fein will lead a new government because of Northern Ireland’s delicate power-sharing politics and …

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