Politics

Bloomberg The US announced a new package of sanctions on Russian elites, lawmakers and defense companies, punishments designed to ramp up pressure on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine. The measures announced Thursday during summit meetings between President Joe Biden and Nato, as well as the Group of Seven, will be followed by others to reduce Europe’s reliance on Russian ...

Bloomberg North Korea launched what appeared to be its first intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in more than four years, as Kim Jong-un finally abandoned a testing freeze that had underpinned an unprecedented wave of talks with the US. The missile was launched from the Sunan area outside Pyongyang on Thursday, reaching an altitude of 6,200 kilometres (3,900 miles) and traveling ...

  Bloomberg Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi arrived in Kabul unannounced and held talks with the Taliban’s Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and others leaders, his first visit since the militant group seized power last year. “Important issues” related to joint efforts in alleviating the country’s humanitarian crisis and improving bilateral trade were on the agenda, the Taliban’s deputy spokesman ...

Bloomberg President Cyril Ramaphosa defended South Africa’s neutral stance towards Russia’s war with Ukraine, saying it placed him in a stronger position to help mediate an end to the conflict. “Neutrality can cost and fortunately we’re not alone in all this, there are many others that have chosen the same path,” Ramaphosa said in an interview with Bloomberg Television on ...

Bloomberg President Joe Biden faces a crucial test of his ability to project power and reassurance amid the biggest European security crisis in decades, as he seeks to rally US allies around harder-hitting sanctions to punish Russia for invading Ukraine. Biden will join back-to-back summits Thursday with Nato, the Group of Seven and the European Union in Brussels, where the ...

Bloomberg Poland expelled 45 Russian diplomats after arresting a low-level civil servant on suspicion of spying, joining a counter-espionage crackdown taking places across the EU’s east following Moscow’s attack of Ukraine. The diplomats, which Polish intelligence identified as officers of the Russian special services and their associates, will have to leave the country in the next five days, Foreign Ministry ...

  Bloomberg Finland has taken legal custody of 21 yachts while it investigates whether their owners are sanctioned following Russia’s attack on Ukraine. The luxury boats sit in winter storage and cannot be transferred while Finnish Customs looks into their beneficial owners, Sami Rakshit, head of the enforcement department, said by phone on Wednesday. Asked to describe the boats, Rakshit ...

Bloomberg Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged Japanese lawmakers to expand their already unprecedented sanctions regime against Russia, saying he needed more help to turn back the “tsunami of brutal invasion.” In a speech on Wednesday to the Japanese Diet, Zelenskiy reiterated his call for a trade embargo against Russia. The video address — like his other appeals to supportive parliaments ...

  Bloomberg The US and Philippines will hold their biggest military drills in three decades as tensions grow with China, injecting new life into a defense alliance that had languished in recent years. Some 5,100 American soldiers and 3,800 Philippine military members will train in the Southeast Asian nation from March 28 to April 8, the US Embassy in Manila ...

  Bloomberg A Russian court on Tuesday sentenced jailed opposition leader Alexey Navalny to nine years in a high-security prison in a ruling that will keep President Vladimir Putin’s top critic sidelined amid a harsh crackdown on the opposition. Navalny, who is currently serving a two-and-a-half year sentence that the European Court of Human Rights called politically motivated, in a ...