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Russia Ukraine Crisis Highlights | The United States and European allies are exploring banning imports of Russian oil, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Sunday, and the White House coordinated with key Congressional committees moving forward with their own ban.
Europe relies on Russia for crude oil and natural gas but has become more open to the idea of banning Russian products in the past 24 hours, a source familiar with the discussions told Reuters on Sunday.
The White House is also talking with the Senate Finance Committee and House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee about a potential ban, the source said.
Still, Blinken also stressed the importance of maintaining steady oil supplies globally.
"We are now in very active discussions with our European partners about banning the import of Russian oil to our countries, while of course, at the same time, maintaining a steady global supply of oil," Blinken said in an interview on NBC’s "Meet the Press" show.
Blinken, who is on a trip across Europe to coordinate with allies the response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, also said he discussed oil imports with President Joe Biden and his cabinet on Saturday.
Oil prices have soared over the past week after the United States and its allies sanctioned Russia over the invasion.
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators introduced a bill on Thursday to ban U.S. imports of Russian oil. The bill is getting fastracked and could ultimately become the vehicle for the sanctions.
After Russia invaded Ukraine, the White House slapped sanctions on exports of technologies to Russia’s refineries and the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which has never launched.
So far, it has stopped short of targeting Russia’s oil and gas exports as the Biden administration weighs the impacts on global oil markets and U.S. energy prices.
Asked if the United States has ruled out banning Russian oil imports unilaterally, Blinken said: ”I’m not going to rule out taking action one way or another, irrespective of what they do, but everything we’ve done, the approach starts with coordinating with allies and partners,” Blinken said.
He said there were a series of additional measures that the United States was looking at to increase the pressure on Russia, but he did not provide any details on what the new measures would be.
Americans are by far the world’s heaviest consumers of gasoline, thanks to big cars, long driving distances and little public transportation in many areas. Rising gas prices have traditionally been political poison for U.S. leaders.
The U.S. national average for a gallon of gasoline hit $4.009 on Sunday, the highest level since July 2008, according to AAA. Consumers are on average paying 40 cents more than a week ago, and 57 cents more than a month ago.
The United States imported more than 20.4 million barrels of crude and refined products a month on average in 2021 from Russia, about 8% of U.S. liquid fuel imports, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA).
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Ukraine has suffered about $10 billion in damage to infrastructure since Russia invaded the country, Infrastructure Minister Oleksander Kubrakov said on Monday. He said in televised comments that the figure stood as of Sunday, and added: "The majority of (damaged) structures will be repaired in a year, and the most difficult onesin two years."
Kubrakov said 40,000 people had been evacuated from the eastern city of Kharkiv on Sunday. But Ukraine has appealed to Russia to let civilians leave other cities and an Interior ministry official, Vadym Denysenko, said 4,000 civilians still needed to be evacuated from the outskirts of the capital Kyiv. (Reuters)
The United Nations Security Council on Monday will hold a meeting to discuss the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Ukraine, diplomats said, after more than 1.7 million Ukrainians have so far crossed into central Europe. The meeting was expected to start at 3 p.m. ET (2000GMT), three diplomats said.
The United Nations has been at the forefront of diplomatic efforts urging an end to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Russia has called the campaign it launched on Feb. 24 a "special military operation". France and Mexico last week worked on a resolution to the U.N. Security Council to address the humanitarian impact, but it was unclear if it would be formally tabled on Monday's meeting. (Reuters)
More than 1.7 million Ukrainians fleeing Russia's invasion have so far crossed into Central Europe, the United Nation's refugee agency said on Monday, as thousands more streamed across the borders.
Poland - which has the largest Ukrainian community in Central Europe - has received more than 1 million Ukrainian refugees since the conflict began on Feb. 24, with the milestone passed late on Sunday.
"This is a million human tragedies, a million people banished from their homes by the war," the Polish border guard service tweeted late on Sunday. A total of 1,735,068 civilians - mostly women and children, as men stayed home to fight - have so far crossed the border into Central Europe, the UNHCR said. (Reuters)
The bodies of 13 civilians were recovered from rubble after an air strike on a bread factory in the Ukrainian town of Makariv in the Kyiv region on Monday, local emergency services said in an online statement. Five people were rescued, it said, adding that in total around 30 people were believed to have been at the factory before the attack. (Reuters)
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has catapulted defence spending up the political agenda in Europe and could herald a new era of purchases led by Germany, according to weapons makers gathering at an arms fair in Saudi Arabia this week.
The World Defense Show, where Europe's Airbus, MBDA and Leonardo are exhibiting alongside nearly 600 other weapons makers, is taking place amid the largest assault on an European state in 70 years.
The conflict has reignited interest in security issues after years of European defence spending cuts and fatigue following NATO failures in Afghanistan. (Reuters)
Warning that ongoing Russia-Ukraine war may derail government's record borrowing programme next fiscal amid the jittery in the market, a report has said the RBI can cushion the impact and smooth-sail the debt financing plan by adopting some innovative steps. After the continuing mayhem in the market in the wake of the war, the government was quick to clarify that it is unlikely to borrow in March as the runaway crude prices have been pushing down US yields, which in turn pushed up domestic yields, leading to larger interest outgo on the government's close to Rs 81 lakh crore of outstanding debt.
Russian shelling is preventing the evacuation of civilians from Kyiv, Mariupol, Sumy, Kharkiv, Volnovakha and Mykolayiv, Ukraine's Foreign Ministry said on Monday. "This prevents the safe passage of humanitarian columns with Ukrainian and foreign citizens, as well as the delivery of medicines and food," it said in a statement. The ministry called on foreign leaders to force Russia to observe a ceasefire to prevent what it said could be a humanitarian catastrophe.
The Polish government passed a draft bill to create an 8 billion zloty ($1.75 billion) fund to help war refugees from Ukraine. The United Nations estimates more than 1.5 million people have fled Ukraine since Russia attacked its neighbour on Feb. 24. More than 1 million have crossed the border into Poland. Many thousands have been hosted across the country, but the aid effort has been predominantly shouldered by non-governmental organizations, volunteers and municipalities. The legislation aims to allow the funding of food and temporary lodgings for refugees, along with measures allowing them to legally work and access public healthcare and social assistance in Poland. "Our initial assumption is that the fund we will set up will amount to about 8 billion zloty. That will finance the most urgent supplies and lodging but also the access to the labour market, social benefits and education," Minister Lukasz Schreiber told private broadcaster Radio Plus earlier on Monday. The bill, which would also provide a 300 zloty one-off benefit for each refugee and financial assistance for Poles hosting Ukrainians, was set to be approved by the Polish parliament on Tuesday in a fast track legislative procedure. A family hosting refuges from Ukraine will be able to receive up to 1,200 zloty each month for a period of two months.
The Polish government passed a draft bill to create an 8 billion zloty ($1.75 billion) fund to help war refugees from Ukraine. The United Nations estimates more than 1.5 million people have fled Ukraine since Russia attacked its neighbour on Feb. 24. More than 1 million have crossed the border into Poland. Many thousands have been hosted across the country, but the aid effort has been predominantly shouldered by non-governmental organizations, volunteers and municipalities. The legislation aims to allow the funding of food and temporary lodgings for refugees, along with measures allowing them to legally work and access public healthcare and social assistance in Poland."Our initial assumption is that the fund we will set up will amount to about 8 billion zloty. That will finance the most urgent supplies and lodging but also the access to the labour market, social benefits and education," Minister Lukasz Schreiber told private broadcaster Radio Plus earlier on Monday.
The bill, which would also provide a 300 zloty one-off benefit for each refugee and financial assistance for Poles hosting Ukrainians, was set to be approved by the Polish parliament on Tuesday in a fast track legislative procedure. A family hosting refuges from Ukraine will be able to receive up to 1,200 zloty each month for a period of two months. Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said Poland could count on financial assistance from abroad to compensate for funds Warsaw was earmarking for the refugees. "This bill is above all meant to offer some sort of a substitute of a normal life for all those people that came to Poland," Morawiecki told reporters after the passage of the bill by his Cabinet.
