Month: May 2022

EU Considers Sanctions on Russian Oil, Banks

The European Union considered new sanctions against Russia on Wednesday, including measures targeting Russia’s oil and banking industries. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has pushed for more extensive European actions to cut off imports of Russian energy, and said earlier this week that a new EU package “should include clear steps to block Russia’s revenues from energy resources.” Inside Ukraine, Russia intensified its shelling in the eastern and southern parts of the country, actions that Zelenskyy characterized as Russian forces reacting “with great anger to our successes.” “The sheer scale of today’s shelling clearly does not indicate that Russia has any …

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Pope Wants to Meet with Putin in Moscow

Pope Francis said in an interview published on Tuesday that he has asked for a meeting in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin to try to stop the war in Ukraine but had not received a reply. The pontiff also told the Italian daily Corriere Della Sera that Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church, who has given the war his backing, “cannot become Putin’s altar boy.” Francis told the newspaper that about three weeks into the war, he asked the Vatican’s top diplomat to send a message to Putin about setting up a meeting.   “We have not yet …

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Mariupol Mayor Says 100,000 Citizens Remain

The mayor of Ukraine’s besieged city of Mariupol said Tuesday 100,000 citizens remained in the city, while Ukrainian officials awaited the arrival of the first group of people who were able to leave a bombed-out steel plant. Mayor Vadym Boychenko said those still in the city included some civilians trapped in the bunkers and tunnels under the Azovstal iron and steel works.  There are an estimated 2,000 Ukrainian troops holed up there as well. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Monday that only civilians had so far been able to leave the plant and that Ukraine’s government was continuing to …

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