EU asks citizens to ‘be patient’ as anti-Russian sanctions bite

Josep Borrell says the EU’s anti-Russian sanctions will crush Moscow any minute now

EU foreign policy head Josep Borrell has called on Europeans to show “strategic patience” while months worth of supposedly devastating sanctions against Russia take effect.

The sanctions imposed by the EU and like-minded partners are already hitting Vladimir Putin and his associates hard,” Borrell declared in a blog post on Sunday, insisting “their impact on the Russian economy will only increase.”

We need strategic patience until Russia stops its aggression and Ukraine is able to regain its full sovereignty,” he added. 


READ MORE: What’s in the EU’s 6th package of anti-Russian sanctions?

The EU has passed six packages of punishing sanctions targeting Moscow, yet the bloc itself has stumbled into an increasingly dire gas shortage and a currency whose value recently dipped below that of the US dollar for the first time ever. 

One of the most recent sanctions seeks to cut 90% of Europe’s oil purchases from Russia by the end of 2022. Borrell acknowledged that “this rapid detoxification from Russian energy involves significant costs or a number of countries and sectors that we will have to face.” However, he insisted it was a small price to pay, warning that a Russian victory would amount to the destruction of western democracy itself, as well as the “rules-based international order.

The energy-related sanctions in the latest package make a notable exception for member states with “no viable alternative options” for energy, a loophole presumably met for Hungary, which has staunchly opposed an oil embargo on the grounds that it would harm the Hungarian people much more than it would inconvenience the Russians.

Borrell insisted earlier this month that Europe does not want war with Russia, arguing the sanctions are key to countering Moscow’s “aggression” and declaring the financial restrictions were already having an effect. 

Along with the US, Europe has poured billions of dollars’ worth of weapons and financial aid into Ukraine since Russia’s ‘military operation’ began in February. Borrell has promised not to allow Kiev to run out of weapons. 


READ MORE: EU won’t let Ukraine run out of weapons – Borrell

Russia sent troops into Ukraine on February 24, citing Kiev’s failure to implement the Minsk agreements, designed to give the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk special status within the Ukrainian state. The protocols, brokered by Germany and France, were first signed in 2014. Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has since admitted that Kiev’s main goal was to use the ceasefire to buy time and “create powerful armed forces.

In February 2022, the Kremlin recognized the Donbass republics as independent states and demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join any Western military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked.

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Guterres hails healer and ‘mentor to generations’, Nelson Mandela

The UN chief in his message to mark Monday’s International Day in honour of Nelson Mandela, hailed the first Black President of post-Apartheid South Africa and racial justice icon, “a giant of our time”, who remains a “moral compass” for us all.

Read the full story, “Guterres hails healer and ‘mentor to generations’, Nelson Mandela”, on globalissues.org

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Contents of Shinzo Abe’s suspected assassin’s letter revealed – media

Tetsuya Yamagami had reportedly hinted that he was going to kill Japan’s former prime minister

The man who is believed to have assassinated Japan’s former prime minister Shinzo Abe earlier this month had dropped hints about his plans in a letter penned earlier, reports in Japanese media claim.

On Sunday, several news outlets suggested that Tetsuya Yamagami had at some point sent a written message to a critic of the Unification Church – the organization the 41-year-old blames for his family’s downfall. In the letter, Yamagami, among other things, levelled harsh criticism at Abe, who he believed had links to the said religious group.

According to the media citing the letter’s recipient, whose identity has not been disclosed, the would-be assassin had gone so far as to indicate that he wanted to kill the former premier.

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Police officers work at the scene where former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot in Nara, Japan, on July 8, 2022.
Possible motive behind Shinzo Abe’s assassination revealed

Yamagami is quoted as saying he had “felt bitter” toward Abe, who in his eyes had been “one of the most influential sympathizers of the Unification Church in the real world.

Police are now reportedly aware of the message.

The former prime minister was shot on July 8 while delivering an electoral campaign speech on the streets of the city of Nara.

The politician was rushed to hospital; however, despite doctors’ attempts at resuscitating him, he showed “no vital signs” and was soon pronounced dead.

The suspected assassin, who was in possession of a homemade gun, was pinned down by police at the scene.

Yamagami later revealed to investigators that his mother’s donations to the Unification Church had seen his family go broke, with the suspect’s uncle confirming that the woman had shelled out a total of ¥100 million ($720,000).

The organization, officially known as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, is a relatively new religious movement founded in South Korea in 1954 by Sun Myung Moon, who claimed to be a messiah.

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Kenya’s Kuruwitu corals are back, thanks to local conservation drive

A small, quiet village in Kenya has found a new purpose in the fishing industry through a successful marine coral conservation project, the first of its kind in the Marine Protected Areas of the western side of the Indian Ocean.

Read the full story, “Kenya’s Kuruwitu corals are back, thanks to local conservation drive”, on globalissues.org

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