Riyadh is not going to pick sides between Moscow and Kiev, the Saudi economy minister says
Saudi Arabia will maintain its extensive trade relations with both Ukraine and Russia, Economy and Planning Minister Faisal Al-Ibrahim said on Tuesday on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
Speaking to Japan’s Nikkei newspaper, the minister said Western sanctions against Russia are “unilateral” and will remain as such.
Al-Ibrahim also praised Moscow’s role in the OPEC+ format, which unites major oil exporters.
The minister explained that Riyadh does not plan to increase oil output in order to lower prices, explaining that his country is currently focused on supply stability rather than more volume. He argued that the situation on international energy markets would be “much worse” if not for OPEC’s efforts.
The US, the EU and their allies have slapped Moscow with unprecedented sanctions following Russia’s military offensive in Ukraine. The restrictions have targeted Russia’s financial and banking sectors as well as aviation and the space industry. Numerous government officials, public figures and businessmen have been slapped with personal sanctions.
The US and Canada have banned Russian oil imports, while the EU is still debating the issue. The measure, which was expected to be included in Brussels’ sixth round of sanctions since the start of the conflict, has faced resistance from Hungary.
On Tuesday, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen argued that the bloc continues to buy Russian oil supposedly to prevent Moscow from taking it to the world market and profiting from soaring prices.
Other nations have been reluctant to join the Western sanctions push. China increased its energy imports from Russia in April. Purchases of oil, gas and coal soared by 75% last month, according to Bloomberg.
India has said it could invest in energy projects in Russia abandoned by Western companies such as Exxon and Shell. In Europe, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has compared the sanctions with a nuclear bomb, arguing they could backfire and lead to food shortages and mass migration.
Russia launched its offensive against Ukraine in late February, following Kiev’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements, first signed in 2014, and Moscow’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German- and French-brokered protocols were designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.
The Kremlin has since demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.
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Dutch journalists and internet providers object to “undemocratic censorship measures”
A coalition of Dutch journalists, internet providers and civil society groups announced on Monday that they will be challenging the EU decision to ban RT and Sputnik before the European Court of Justice. While they don’t endorse the content of either outlet, the coalition said the hastily implemented censorship was undemocratic and raises constitutional questions.
The EU’s Council of Ministers banned RT and Sputnik on March 2, citing the conflict in Ukraine, and said it would remain in effect until Russia stops conducting, what it called, “disinformation and information manipulation actions against the EU and its member states.”
That was a hasty political decision, undertaken “without doing justice to the freedom of information enshrined in human rights treaties, which is a foundation of our democracy,” the Dutch Association of Journalists (NVJ) said on Monday. The NVJ is joining with the Press Freedom Fund (Persvrijheidsfonds) and three internet service providers to challenge the ban before the Luxembourg-based ECJ, and will file the application on Tuesday, the group said.
“We are not fans of RT and Sputnik,” Thomas Bruning of the NVJ told the Dutch public broadcaster NOS, calling the outlets “state propaganda.” However, he added, the ban prevents “anyone from being able to request that information, including scientists and journalists. We do not think it is up to European government leaders to determine what can and cannot be found on the internet.”
The coalition seeks to address the “legitimacy and proportionality” of the ban, and whether “undemocratic censorship measures” are justified, the plaintiffs said in a statement.
“The fact that ISPs have to block access to information as a result of the measure is at odds with the principle of net neutrality,” Anco Scholte ter Horst, director of the internet provider Freedom Internet, said in a statement on joining the lawsuit. “In the democratic constitutional state, a free and open internet is absolutely necessary.”
Scholte ter Horst described the EU ban to NOS as a decision “taken with panic and haste,” which is “not proportional and opens the door to more such blockages,” pointing out that ISPs have previously been told they can’t interfere with content on the principle of net neutrality.
This is a threat to the open internet.
As a result of the EU ban, RT and Sputnik broadcasts – and even their accounts on some social media platforms – are inaccessible in the bloc’s territory. Australia, Canada and the UK have followed suit. The US has a constitutional ban on overt censorship, but the Silicon Valley-based YouTube has blocked RT and Sputnik’s accounts.
Condemning the censorship, RT’s deputy editor-in-chief Anna Belkina said its critics had not “pointed to a single example, a single grain of evidence that what RT has reported over these days, and continues to report, is not true.”
Russia has retaliated by blocking the websites of several Western state outlets, such as the BBC, Deutsche Welle, and the US-run Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Svoboda. Earlier this month, Moscow also revoked the visas and credentials of the CBC, citing Canada’s decision in March to ban RT’s English and French broadcasts.
Davos, May 23 (IPS) – Against a backdrop of ongoing social changes, education is becoming increasingly important for success in life. But with disasters, pandemics, armed conflicts, and political crises forcing children out of school, a future of success is often placed far out of reach.
