Important Takeaways:
- China has been supporting Russia’s economy since the start of the Ukraine war by buying its oil while supplying it with everything from microelectronics to washing machines.
- Meanwhile, Beijing has been getting its own strategic benefit: a real-world case study in how to circumvent Western sanctions.
- Russia’s economy has been surprisingly resilient throughout the Ukraine war, but it has shown fresh signs of cracking under Western pressure recently. In the past week, the Russian ruble plunged to its lowest point since the early days of the conflict after the U.S. imposed new banking sanctions.
- Moscow owes much of its economic durability to its oil exports and its cooperation with Beijing, as the leaders of both countries seek to challenge the U.S.-led world order.
- “Sanctions can be really disruptive for any production sector that is enmeshed in global supply chains,” Fishman said. “That makes China highly vulnerable.”
- While the U.S. has already imposed sanctions on China, including export restrictions on advanced semiconductors and measures against telecommunications giant Huawei, a crisis over Taiwan could lead to an economic war of a different magnitude.
- Full-scale financial sanctions by the West would disrupt the country’s financial system, interrupt trade and put $3.7 trillion in Chinese overseas bank assets and reserves at risk, according to a report last year by the Atlantic Council and Rhodium Group think tanks.
- One major lesson for China from Russia’s experience has been the importance of preparation, analysts say. Before the war, Russia had sought to diversify its foreign reserves, de-dollarize its economy and build domestic financial plumbing. Even though its success was mixed, those moves helped shield the Russian economy and buy it time to adapt.
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Important Takeaways:
- The statement by Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council and Vladimir Putin’s predecessor as president, came as the West sharply escalated sanctions on Moscow in efforts to degrade its ability to wage war in Ukraine.
- “We need to (respond). Not only the authorities, the state, but all our people in general. After all, they – the U.S. and its crappy allies – have declared a war on us without rules!” Medvedev wrote on his official Telegram channel, which has over 1.3 million followers.
- “Every day we should try to do maximum harm to those countries that have imposed these restrictions. Harm their economies, their institutions and their rulers. Harm the well-being of their citizens, their confidence in the future.”
- Diplomats say Medvedev gives a flavor of hardline and high level thinking in the Kremlin, though Kyiv and Kremlin critics play down his influence, casting him as a scaremonger whose job is to deter Western action over Ukraine.
- In his latest comments he spoke of the need to find critical vulnerabilities in Western economies, to target energy, industry, transport, banking and social services, and to stir up social tensions.
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Important Takeaways:
- Biden announces 500 sanctions against Russia as payback for war, Navalny
- Biden said the sanctions are payback for Mr. Navalny’s death in an Arctic prison and designed to coincide with the second anniversary of Mr. Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine.
- “These sanctions will target individuals connected to Navalny’s imprisonment as well as Russia’s financial sector, defense industrial base, procurement networks and sanctions evaders across multiple continents,” Mr. Biden said. “They will ensure Putin pays an even steeper price for his aggression abroad and repression at home.”
- Biden also said he is imposing 100 export restrictions on entities that are providing “backdoor” support for Russia’s war effort.
- The U.S. and Western nations have imposed crippling sanctions on Russia over its war on Ukraine, only to see Moscow find end-runs around the restrictions or new global partners to keep its economy afloat.
- The president scolded the Republican-led House for failing to take up a Senate-passed supplemental bill that includes $60 billion in aid for Ukraine.
- The U.S. has provided more than $75 billion already. Some lawmakers say there is no clear plan for a Ukrainian victory so it doesn’t make sense to throw more American treasure at the effort or to help more Ukrainian soldiers to die in what is a never-ending stalemate.
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Important Takeaways:
- Hungary Vows to Block EU Sanctions Against Tucker Carlson over Putin Interview
- …former Belgian prime minister and current member of the European Parliament, Guy Verhofstadt called for an EU travel ban to be imposed on the American journalist and for the bloc to begin the process to levy sanctions…
- However, the body does not have unilateral authority to sanction individuals but rather can merely present evidence to the European Council…
- Therefore, socially conservative Hungary has the ability to block the EU from sanctioning Carlson and on Tuesday confirmed that it would do so if the measure was put before the Council.
- The instant shutdown from Budapest will likely further rile Verhofstadt, who has been at the forefront of calling for the elimination of veto power for EU member states over Hungary’s opposition to funding for the war in Ukraine.
- The principle of unanimity and the enforcement mechanism of national veto powers, in a similar fashion to the allocation of senators or electoral college votes in the United States, was an essential component of the formation of the European Union as it guaranteed that smaller member states could not be entirely overpowered by larger nations such as France or Germany.
- Verhofstadt is not alone in favoring the abolition of national veto power, with the bloc’s top diplomat, Foreign Affairs chief Josep Borrell, arguing in December that in light of the threat Russia poses to European democracy, it may be necessary to end unanimity for foreign policy decisions
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Important Takeaways:
- The Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) banned eight local banks from making US dollar transactions on 4 February, in an attempt to avoid sanctions and US financial restrictions.
- A CBI document lists the banned banks as Ahsur International Bank for Investment, Investment Bank of Iraq, Union Bank of Iraq, Kurdistan International Islamic Bank for Investment and Development, Al-Huda Bank, Al-Janoob Islamic Bank for Investment and Finance, Arabia Islamic Bank, and Hammurabi Commercial Bank.
- “We commend the continued steps taken by the Central Bank of Iraq to protect the Iraqi financial system from abuse, which has led to legitimate Iraqi banks achieving international connectivity through correspondent banking relationships,” a US Treasury Department spokesman said on Sunday.
- The measures come after Iraqi officials met with the US Treasury Department’s top sanctions official Brian Nelson last week.
- The Finance Committee in the Iraqi parliament made a statement on 31 January calling for the sale of oil in currencies other than the US dollar, aiming to counter US sanctions on the Iraqi banking system.
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Important Takeaways:
- China is helping Russia evade Western sanctions and likely providing Moscow with military and dual-use technology for use in Ukraine, according to an unclassified U.S. intelligence report released on Thursday.
- “The PRC is providing some dual-use technology that Moscow’s military uses to continue the war in Ukraine, despite an international cordon of sanctions and export controls,” the ODNI report said.
- It also said China has become “an even more critical partner” of Russia after Moscow invaded Ukraine last year.
- China has increased it importation of Russia energy exports, including oil and gas rerouted from Europe, the report said.
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- U.S. Preparing More Sanctions on North Korea, Sullivan Says
- U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan says the United States is working a new round of sanctions against North Korea
- As Pyongyang forges ahead with banned missile development and signals a possible new nuclear test.
- North Korea has said denuclearization is off the table, and accused the United States and its allies of pursing “hostile” policies, including sanctions, that have left it no choice but to expand its military.
- Decades of U.S.-led sanctions have not halted North Korea’s increasingly sophisticated missile and nuclear weapon programs, and China and Russia have blocked recent efforts to impose more United Nations sanctions
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Putin mocks the West, says Russia is gaining from the Ukraine conflict and will press on
- “I’m sure that we haven’t lost anything and we won’t lose anything,” he told an annual economic forum in Russia’s far-eastern port city of Vladivostok. “The most important gain is the strengthening of our sovereignty, it’s an inevitable result of what’s going on.”
- He added that the economic and financial situation in Russia had stabilized, consumer prices inflation had slowed down and unemployment has remained low.
- “Everything unnecessary, harmful and everything that keeps us from moving forward will be abandoned,” he said, adding that Western sanctions were “a danger to the entire world.”
- Taking aim at foreign corporations that have pulled out of Russia since the invasion, Putin said that many European companies were now folding because of their choice to leave.
- He added that Western attempts to cap prices for Russian oil and gas were “stupid” and Moscow will have enough customers in Asia.
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- What Putin wants from Iran and why Tehran might be cautious
- “Russia deepening an alliance with Iran to kill Ukrainians is something that the whole world should look at and see as a profound threat,” U.S. National Security adviser Jake Sullivan said
- S. officials have said Iran is preparing to help supply Russia with several hundred unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, including some that are capable of firing weapons
- “Beyond supplying UAVs Iran can also help Russia evade sanctions and potentially collaborate on the manufacture of weapons systems that are less dependent upon supply chains through Western countries,” he said.
Read the original article by clicking here.
Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Top Russian Official’s Crazed Threat: Alaska Takeover Could Be Next
- Russia’s lower house speaker, Vyacheslav Volodin, warned the United States ought to hesitate when seizing or freezing Russian assets abroad, and instead ought to remember that Alaska previously belonged to Russia.
- “Let America always remember, there is a part of [Russian] territory: Alaska,” Volodin said, according to Hromadske. “So when they start trying to dispose of our resources abroad, before they do it, let them think: we also have something to return.”
- Medvedev suggested the United States hasn’t been held accountable for several bloody encounters and territorial grabs itself, and that it would do well to not look at Russia before examining its own history.
- “The entire U.S. history since the times of subjugation of the native Indian population represents a series of bloody wars,” Medvedev said. “The U.S. and its useless stooges should remember the words of the Bible: Do not judge and you will not be judged… so that the great day of His wrath doesn’t come to their home one day.”
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