A 30-day grace period on interest payments originally due May 27 expired Sunday. But it could take time to confirm a default. “While there is a possibility that some magic could occur” and Russia gets the money through financial institutions to bondholders despite sanctions, “nobody’s making that bet,” said Jay S. Auslander, a top debt … Read more
WITH PRIME Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin listening, Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday said the “must abandon Cold War mentality” and “confrontation block” — and “oppose unilateral sanctions and abuse of sanctions”. Xi’s references to the Cold War and blocs at the annual summit of the five-nation group appeared to target … Read more
Russia Ukraine War Live, Mariupol Fall to Russia: Hundred days ago, Russian President Vladimir announced a special operation to “denazify” Ukraine. Since then, the war has shown no sign of abating with both Ukrainian and Russian troops claiming victories in various parts of the country. While Ukrainian troops were largely successful in keeping Kremlin’s soldiers … Read more
Written by David E. Sanger and William J. Broad The old nuclear order, rooted in the Cold War’s unthinkable outcomes, was fraying before Russia invaded Ukraine. Now, it is giving way to a looming era of disorder unlike any since the beginning of the Atomic Age. Russia’s regular reminders over the past three months of … Read more
When Vladimir Putin announced the invasion of Ukraine, war seemed far away from Russian territory. Yet within days the conflict came home — not with cruise missiles and mortars but in the form of unexpected and unexpected extensive volleys of sanctions by Western governments and economic punishment by corporations. Three months after the Feb. 24 … Read more
The fall of Mariupol, the battle for Kharkiv, the shifting of focus to Donbas and the impending expansion of Nato membership — much has happened in the third month of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Since the Russian troops first set foot in Ukraine’s towns and cities on February 24, the war initiated by Russian … Read more
Written by Andrew E. Kramer Through binoculars, the Ukrainian soldiers can see the Russian position far in the distance. But the single gun weapon they operate at a small, ragtag outpost on the southern steppe has insufficient range to strike it. These circumstances have imposed a numbingly grim routine on the Ukrainians, who are pounded … Read more
“Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” This quote from George Orwell’s world-famous novel “1984” describes in one sentence the importance of history in politics. The quote finds a place in the preface of the recently published book “Dancing on Bones,” authored by journalist Katie Stallard. In the … Read more
Russia’s 3-month-old invasion of nearly Ukraine has been punctu by flawed planning, poor intelligence, barbarity and wanton destruction. But obscured in the daily fighting is the geographic reality that Russia has made gains on the ground. The Russian Defense Ministry said Tuesday that its forces in eastern Ukraine had advanced to the border between Donetsk … Read more
The European Union has been plagued by a demographic issue for a long time — the region is getting older and more people are dying than being born. Europe’s median age of 43 is nearly four years older than that of North America, the next-greyest region. The population of the European Union is expected to … Read more