2022年4月5日星期二

Tuesday Briefing: Kyiv mayor calls for halt to 'bloody money' flow to Russia

Tuesday, April 5, 2022

by Linda Noakes

Hello

Here's what you need to know.

Satellite images show civilian deaths in Bucha while it was in Russian hands, Biden urges a war crimes trial for Putin, and the U.S. stops Russian bond payments

Today's biggest stories

Local resident Viktoria Mukhina plants tulips near a damaged apartment building in the southern port city of Mariupol, Ukraine, April 4, 2022. REUTERS/Alexander Ermochenko

RUSSIA AND UKRAINE AT WAR

The flow of "bloody money" to Russia must stop, Kyiv's mayor said as the West prepared new sanctions on Moscow after dead civilians were found lining the streets of a Ukrainian town seized from Russian invaders.

Since Russian forces withdrew from northern Ukraine, turning their assault on the south and east, grim images from the town of Bucha near Kyiv, including a mass grave and bound bodies of people shot at close range, have prompted international outrage.

Ukraine said it was bracing for about 60,000 Russian reservists to be called in to reinforce Moscow's offensive in the east, where Russia's main targets have included the port of Mariupol and Kharkiv, the country's second-largest city.

Satellite images taken weeks ago of Bucha show bodies of civilians on a street, a private U.S. company said, undercutting the Russian government's claims that Ukrainian forces caused the deaths or that the scene was staged.

Ukrainians who cut their teeth in the 2014 street uprising that ousted then-President Viktor Yanukovich are now in a vanguard of volunteers fighting "Russian propaganda", which for years had spread inside Ukraine and beyond. Eight years of practice in countering disinformation, they say, prepared them for Russia's invasion.

U.S. President Joe Biden accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of war crimes and called for a trial. Biden's National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters that the U.S. would build a case at the International Criminal Court or another venue.

Here's what you need to know about the conflict right now

BUSINESS

The United States stopped the Russian government from paying holders of its sovereign debt more than $600 million from reserves held at U.S. banks, in a move meant to eat into Moscow's holdings of dollars.

The fallout of the Russia and Ukraine war has just helped tip two of world's poorest countries into full-blown crises, and the list of those at risk - and the queue at the International Monetary Fund's door - will only get longer from here.

Australia's central bank opened the door to the first interest rate increase in more than a decade as it dropped a previous pledge to be "patient" on policy, a major surprise that sent the local dollar to nine-month highs.

The NFT bubble isn't popping, but it may have sprung a leak. A year on from when a single non-fungible token sold for $69.3 million in crypto at Christie's auction house, this weird and wild market is showing some signs of slowing down.

Did Elon Musk break securities laws again? Former securities officials and professors said Musk may have missed a key disclosure deadline when he bought 9% of Twitter. And Securities and Exchange Commission regulators could use any shortfall to try to punish Musk more for other lapses, some believe.

Residents line up for COVID-19 testing in Shanghai, China, April 4, 2022. REUTERS/Aly Song


WORLD

Chinese authorities extended the lockdown of Shanghai to cover all of the financial center's 26 million people, after city-wide testing saw new COVID-19 cases surge to more than 13,000 amid growing public anger over quarantine rules.

At least 41 Sri Lankan lawmakers walked out of the ruling coalition, leaving the government of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in a minority in parliament as it struggles with the country's worst economic crisis in decades.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who faces elections on Sunday, has implemented a raft of laws and measures aimed at tackling violent extremism and Islamist radicals who challenge France’s secular values. But rights activists and the Muslim community say the powers give authorities carte blanche to shutter places of worship without having to submit to proper scrutiny.

An alleged Janjaweed militia leader pleaded not guilty to dozens of charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity at the first ever trial at the International Criminal Court dealing with Sudan's Darfur conflict of nearly two decades ago.

Peruvian President Pedro Castillo imposed a curfew in the capital, Lima, banning people from leaving their homes in an attempt to curb protests against rising fuel and fertilizer costs that have spread throughout the country.

U.S.

Former President Barack Obama will return to the White House today for the first time since leaving office in 2017 to tout the benefits of his signature healthcare law and offer backing to Biden.

U.S. Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson secured the support of two more Senate Republicans, as she cleared a procedural hurdle toward becoming the first Black woman to serve on the nation's top judicial body.

America’s most prominent conservative gathering, founded on ideals of personal liberty and limited government, convenes in Budapest next month to celebrate a European leader accused of undermining democracy and individual rights. We look at how the conference with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban reflects a Republican divide.

When Donald Trump holds his next rally in North Carolina on Saturday, he'll be trying to boost his handpicked favorite for the U.S. Senate, Representative Ted Budd, in a tight and intensifying contest for the Republican nomination. The primary will be a test of Trump's power over Republican voters.

New York Mayor Eric Adams announced the launch of digital billboards across Florida denouncing that state's law that bans most classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity and urging the LGBTQ community to move to New York City.

Quote of the day

"The fact that cities are responsible for more than two-thirds of global greenhouse gas emissions means that if cities do something, they can solve two-thirds of the problem."

Karen Seto

Professor at Yale University's School of the Environment

Cities are driving climate change, but are part of the solution

Video of the day

Russian oligarch's yacht seized on behalf of U.S.

Spanish police impounded a superyacht belonging to Viktor Vekselberg on behalf of U.S. authorities, the first time the United States has seized property from a Russian oligarch since the invasion of Ukraine.

And finally…

Gigantic Jupiter-like planet observed still 'in the womb'

Scientists have sighted an enormous planet about nine times the mass of Jupiter at a remarkably early stage of formation, in a discovery that challenges the current understanding of planetary formation.

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