RIYADMEDIA

Using the same kind of rough street language he used 22 years ago when talking about rubbing out Chechen rebels even when they’re in their “outhouses,” Russian President Vladimir Putin midweek took aim at Russians who oppose his invasion of Ukraine, saying Russia should undergo “self-cleansing” and get rid of “bastards and traitors.”

“The Russian people will always be able to distinguish true patriots from scum and traitors and will simply spit them out like a gnat that accidentally flew into their mouths, spit them out on the sidewalk,” he said.

An estimated 200,000 Russians have not waited to be spat out and have left Russia already. Thousands more are planning to leave. Most Russians who have already exited have gone to Armenia, Georgia and Turkey, the easiest countries to reach as airline bans were imposed. Russians also don’t need visas to enter any of the three.

Many of the new Russian exiles contacted by VOA say they chose exile because they felt they had to demonstrate opposition to Russia’s invasion of its neighbor; others feared remaining in a Russia isolated from most of the rest of the world. Still others said they fled because they feared if they stayed, they would fall afoul of the Kremlin’s intensifying crackdown on dissent and end up in jail.

“I realized I could not stay in Russia. I knew I couldn’t be silent,” says Katya, a 27-year-old, who worked in Russia as a PR manager and game blogger. “So, there were two ways: stay in Russia and be imprisoned, or express myself abroad. I also think I can do more in other countries than in prison,” she added.

Untouchables

The new exiles classify themselves as political refugees, but even so — despite being critics of the invasion of Ukraine and deeply opposed to Putin — many say they’re encountering hostility abroad. And they say not enough media attention is being given to their plight. They complain Russia’s pariah status has turned them into untouchables, too.

“Now the whole world hates us,” says Alexandra, 39, a Russian who was born in Tajikistan and whose family fled to Moscow in the 1990s because of the Tajik civil war. She was 7 years old then, and she remembers “how my parents tried not to panic, but my mother could not hold back her tears when we had to leave her books. My library was much more modest, but it was hard to leave my books. I sobbed and remembered my mother,” she said.

Now in Tbilisi, Alexandra says: “I did not choose this [Putin] government, I went to all the rallies, donated to human rights organizations, and attended court trials of political prisoners. But for the whole world now, I am a representative of fascists who, to my great regret, ended up in power in my country.”

Some Russian refugees say they feel guilty complaining about their plight — after all despite what they have lost, from the physical proximity of family, homes and jobs and a settled way of life, they acknowledge they are citizens of a country that invaded a neighbor where people are losing their lives. Even so, they remain shocked at the hostility openly expressed towards them.

Nadya, who was the head of marketing team in Kaluga, a town in western Russia, says she was surprised by the Russophobia she’s encountered in Georgia since arriving in Tbilisi. She says she and her husband know Georgia well, having vacationed in the country every year for the past half-decade. “Never before have we encountered discrimination against Russians — on the contrary we have always been welcome guests here. But we have been deeply struck by how quickly a wave of Russophobia rose among the Georgians,” she says.

“Many Georgians have this logic: if you are against Putin, you should be in Russia now and fighting him there; and they are also afraid that since we have arrived, Russian troops will come to ‘save us’. They blame us for the aggression of the Russian authorities, but we are also victims of this war, just on the other side of the front,” she added.

She notes Ukrainians are “now living through events thousand times more monstrous” than what the Russian refuseniks are suffering, and she stressed it right for everyone to try to help the embattled Ukrainians. “But we did not vote for Putin; we fought against him in every possible way the last 10 years,” she adds.

Aside from anti-Russian hostility in Tbilisi, Istanbul and Yerevan, Russian refugees say they are facing practical challenges. Their Russian bank cards don’t work; it is difficult to find accommodation to rent; jobs are in short supply; and their savings have halved in value thanks to the collapse of the ruble. Dozens of chat channels have sprung up on social-media platforms, such as Telegram, for the new political exiles to swap tips and information.

Activists are also organizing meetings. “It’s important now to be together,” says Alexey. “It helps to overcome all this nightmare, I feel this unity,” he adds.

As they try to get their footing and adjust to their new lives and attenuated circumstances, the refuseniks also appear to be struggling with guilt for what Russia has unleashed on Ukraine and grief for what they have lost.

Lost world

“I had established a comfortable life in Moscow,” says Alexandra, the Tajikistan-born Russian. “All this changed on February 24. The main fear is of never being able to return home to Russia. I also worry about loved ones who cannot or don’t want to leave. It is obvious that the standard of living will fall sharply. Russia is becoming a cross between North Korea, Venezuela and Germany in the 1930s. Understanding this is completely unbearable,” she adds.

But for her the strongest emotion is one of dread. “I can’t believe there’s a war going on. That my country unleashed this war. That we are at war with close neighbors,” she says.

Anton, a 42-year-old Muscovite and father of a four-year-old boy, shares the same sense of overwhelming horror. “My wife and I left Russia because it became impossible to stay in a country that sends people to kill other people, officially claiming creepy and terrible and nonsense grounds for doing so,” he told VOA from the Armenian capital of Yerevan.

“Of course, I was concerned about what work I could do outside Russia. I’m not ready for unskilled labor. I have to support my family. But I cannot be with people who do not admit aggression anymore. For me, it’s clear now we, like Germans, will repent for generations. It is Fascism 2.0,” he said.

Anton said he was nervous they would not get out of Russia. “I was not sure until our plane took off,” he says. He had heard FSB intelligence officers were searching people’s phones and laptops and were stopping people from leaving. “For us, it went easily, but I was still pretty nervous,” he says. He says he has no future plans, and they will have to live off savings when he loses a remote job he has with a European firm, which will happen soon. “I cannot predict what might happen next, so we will take this time to lie low, watch what comes and try to figure out what to do with our torn lives,” he says.

Anastasia, a 23-year-old Muscovite, who has launched one of the most popular Telegram channels for Russian expats in Georgia, says she didn’t have time to think about what exile would mean as she rushed to flee. “Standing finally under a warm shower, I slowly begin to realize my position,” she said. “I am a political refugee [not officially, but actually]. In Moscow, before the war, I had everything, now I have arrived with one suitcase and a backpack in a country where initially I knew no one,” she added.

“I huddle like a stray cat,” she says.

The mass exodus of Russians has now slowed thanks to travel obstacles. But the impact of devastating Western sanctions, along with the ever intensifying crackdown on freedom of speech and the criminalization of opposition to the war, as well as the prospects of job losses and poverty, is prompting thousands of others to plan an escape.

Western diplomats say their consulates in Russia are being inundated with visa requests. Wait times for visa appointments at Israel’s consulates are now running at eight months.

“For many Russians who do not support the war, it’s not safe to stay in Russia anymore,” says a Russian political activist. He worries, though, that the exodus of so many Putin opponents will weaken the opposition to the Kremlin.
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In the weeks before he ordered the invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin traveled to China for a meeting with President Xi Jinping in which they signed a comprehensive cooperation agreement aligning their countries in the ongoing struggle for global influence between Western democracies and rising authoritarian states.

Now, it’s not completely clear that China knew what it was getting into.

Three weeks after Xi put his name on the document declaring that friendship between Russia and China “has no limits” and “no ‘forbidden’ areas of cooperation,” Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has turned Russia into an international pariah, facing devastating sanctions and condemnations from around the globe.

Diplomatic tightrope

For their part, Chinese diplomats have been attempting to walk a tightrope, making high-minded statements about the importance of peace and respect for other countries’ territorial integrity, while studiously avoiding any mention of the fact that it was China’s close ally that launched the bloody war raging in Ukraine.

Writing in The Washington Post on Tuesday, China’s ambassador to the U.S., Qin Gang, insisted that his country had been taken by surprise by the invasion. He sidestepped the question of whether Russia has requested weapons and other supplies from China, as a number of news outlets have reported.

China’s position on Ukraine, he wrote, is that “the purposes and principles of the U.N. Charter must be fully observed; the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all countries, including Ukraine, must be respected; the legitimate security concerns of all countries must be taken seriously; and all efforts that are conducive to the peaceful settlement of the crisis must be supported.”

Slight distancing

While China can’t be said to have distanced itself from Russia over the invasion, the comments by its senior leaders have also fallen short of an endorsement of Putin’s actions. This may reflect a desire to maintain relations with Moscow without damaging China’s reputation with the rest of the world, according to analysts.

“This new partnership agreement that Putin and Xi signed on February 4 certainly raised the possibility as this war rages that China could be judged guilty by association,” Stephen Roach,  a senior fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute of Global Affairs, told VOA.

Timothy Heath, a senior international defense researcher at the California-based RAND Corporation, told VOA in an email that a desire to maintain good relations with the West may affect China’s willingness to provide assistance to Russia as the conflict continues.  

“I do not think China will change its pro-Russia stance any time soon, but it is likely to continue limiting how much help it provides Russia due to Beijing’s desire to maintain good relations with the West, which is far more important to China’s economic development than Russia,” he wrote.

Unexpected results

Experts say whether or not China knew what was coming in Ukraine, its leaders probably hoped Russia’s invasion would be over quickly.

“Perhaps Beijing was hoping for a short, sharp action through which the Russian military would roll over Ukrainian forces and annex the eastern part of Ukraine in the same manner as it did in the Crimea in 2014,” said Anthony Saich, a professor of international affairs and director of the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

“In that scenario, Western outrage would have soon died down, and China would have continued undisturbed in its attempts to present a united front with Russia against a declining and divided West,” he told VOA. “The resistance of Ukrainian forces and its people has put an end to that illusion, and the West’s united and relatively strong response has changed the calculus.”

China’s leverage

Roach said China may have a better chance than any Western government at persuading Russia to change course.

“China is in a unique position because of its partnership agreement with Russia to exercise leverage over Vladimir Putin,” he said. “That is considerably greater than the sanctions that have been imposed by the U.S. and the West.

“Putin has not changed his military posture in response to unprecedented sanctions, and that’s a source of enormous frustration in the West. But China has something that the West does not have, and that is the partnership and the support that comes from that partnership. Russia is a tiny economy, it cannot possibly support a massive conventional war against a country like Ukraine, and it doesn’t have the wherewithal to do it.”

Robert Ross, a professor of political science at Boston College and an associate of Harvard’s Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, said the United States could make the prospect of limiting support for Russia more attractive to China.

“There needs to be some way for America to signal China that there will be some appreciation for Chinese restraint and that the Americans would take this into account as we go forward, because they (China) want to be sure that there is a value in cooperating with America,” he said. “This is the price Americans pay because now, we’re asking for China’s cooperation in the ongoing crisis.”

VOA Mandarin Service reporters Si Yang and Lin Yang contributed to this story.
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Full developments of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine    
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U.S. President Joe Biden announced $800 million in new security assistance to help Ukraine defend itself against the Russian invasion, in addition to the $200 million he allocated last week. This followed an address by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to the U.S. Congress earlier Wednesday. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has this report.
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Announcing tough sanctions against Russian oligarchs over the war in Ukraine was step one.

Now the U.S. and its allies are creating new teams to act on their vow to “seize and freeze” the giant boats, estates and other pricey assets of Russian elites.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday for the first time convened a multilateral task force known as REPO, one of several new efforts dedicated to enforcing sanctions.

REPO — short for Russian Elites, Proxies and Oligarchs — will work with other countries to investigate and prosecute oligarchs and individuals allied with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The group is now looking into 50 individuals, with 28 names publicly announced.

The effort faces several challenges, including varying laws across countries that could make legal discovery difficult and the risk of penalizing innocent people whose property may be tied up in an oligarch’s seized assets.

And time presents a problem: Investigations can drag on for months and years.

Germany, the U.K., France, Italy and other counties are involved in trying to collect and share information against Russians targeted for sanctions, the White House said when it announced the formation of the task force.

It will work alongside another group called KleptoCapture, led by the Justice Department to enforce the economic restrictions within the U.S. imposed on Russia and its billionaires, working with the FBI, Treasury and other federal agencies.

The government says the sanctions imposed already have had a biting effect on the Russian economy.

Russia lost access to vital imports for its military gear and more than $600 billion in assets held by its central bank and faces ongoing rounds of targeted sanctions against companies and the wealthy elite who are tied to Putin.

The Russian stock market has yet to reopen since the sanctions began, while the ratings company Fitch said Russia would likely default if it used rubles to repay dollar-denominated debt due this week. The Institute of International Finance estimates that the Russian economy will shrink by 15% this year, instead of the 3% growth that was expected pre-invasion.

Andrew Adams, a federal prosecutor who is leading the KleptoCapture task force, stressed property seizures must be conducted within the law.

“You cannot just walk up and grab somebody’s yacht. You have to walk through the facts that link the property to a crime,” he told MSNBC in an interview this week. “You have to be able to describe not only what crime was committed with a degree of probable cause, but you have to trace the property to the condition of the crime.”

Ryan Fayhee, a former Justice Department prosecutor and current sanctions attorney at Hughes Hubbard & Reed in Washington, said “the challenge and the time involved with it is going to be demonstrating probable cause to actually justify a seizure.”

“This isn’t like a bank robbery,” Fayhee said, adding that the U.S. government is going to have to tie any potential actions to a U.S. criminal offense. “That’s going to be the challenge and it will take months or years — not days.”

On top of this, the complicated financial instruments that oligarchs invest in will inevitably draw everyday people into seizure actions, says Jonathan C. Poling, a former Justice Department prosecutor who works on sanctions and international trade issues for Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in D.C.

The concern is how do governments impose sanctions “in a way that doesn’t punish innocent people” Poling said.

Both the REPO and KleptoCapture groups will use data analytics, cryptocurrency tracing, intelligence, and data from financial regulators to track sanctions evasion, money laundering and other criminal acts.

Dariya Golubkova, an international trade attorney at Holland & Knight, said cooperation between countries will be a benefit to sanctions enforcement, but there are countries that may be “missing from the international cooperation.”

Golubkova said countries that serve as havens to oligarch’s property will have to cooperate in REPO’s effort, or else sanctions will be less impactful.

The EU Tax Observatory think tank, associated with the Paris School of Economics, has called for a European Asset Registry to assist in sanctions efforts.

Golubkova also predicted that because countries have different search and seizure laws “some of these requirements may so mounting that you can’t get over them.” 
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Engineers have linked Ukraine to an electricity grid spanning much of continental Europe, allowing the country to decouple its power system from hostile Russia, officials said Wednesday. 

Belgium-based ENTSO-E, which represents dozens of transmission system operators in Europe, said the electricity grids of Ukraine and its smaller neighbor Moldova were successfully synchronized with the Continental European Power System on a trial basis. 

“This is a significant milestone,” the group said. 

Grid operators had been preparing such a move after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, but the large-scale Russian military assault on Ukraine last month prompted an emergency request by Kyiv to speed up a process that was expected to take years more to complete. 

ENTSO-E, whose 39 members operate the world’s largest interconnected electrical grid, said the move means they will be able to help maintain the stability of the Ukrainian and Moldovan power systems. 

The two countries were previously part of the Integrated Power System that also includes Russia and Belarus. This made Ukraine dependent on Russia’s grid operator despite having had no electricity trade between the two countries for years. 

“This step will give Ukraine the opportunity to receive electricity if [Russia] continues to destroy our power infrastructure, and thus to save our power system,” said Volodymyr Kudrytskyi, who chairs the management board of Ukraine’s grid operator, Ukrenergo. “We are sincerely grateful to our European partners for their great support and assistance during these difficult times.”

Portugal to Poland 

Georg Zachmann, an expert with the Brussels think tank Bruegel, said the switch would allow energy suppliers in the continental grid that stretches from Portugal to Poland to supply electricity to Ukraine if necessary. 

This could allow Ukraine to turn off some of the coal-fired power plants it currently keeps running to ensure grid stability, saving precious fuel in wartime, he said. 

In the long term, Ukraine could export surplus electricity generated by its nuclear power plants to the rest of Europe. 

“It’s a nice win-win situation,” Zachmann said. “It might even be good for the climate.”
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Amid shelling and gunfire from the Russian invasion, more than 3 million people have fled Ukraine as of mid-March. At this rate, UNHCR officials warn, the exodus could surpass the 2015 Syrian crisis. Aline Barros and VOA Graphics have this report.
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Here’s a look at what U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other top diplomats have been doing this week:

US-Russia-Ukraine

The United States continues to support Ukraine in fending off Russian aggression and provides assistance to refugees fleeing the country in search of safety.

Wednesday (March 16,) President Joe Biden described the latest U.S. package of security assistance to Ukraine – valued at nearly $1 billion – shortly after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appealed to the U.S. Congress for more help in a virtual address. On Tuesday, Biden signed a spending bill that includes around $13.6 billion for Ukraine.

This week, the State Department announced sanctions on key members of Russia’s defense enterprise and individuals.

In a statement on Tuesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced more sanctions on Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko for his role as an ally of Russia during the invasion of Ukraine, blocking Lukashenko and his family from accessing U.S. property and limiting the ability of Americans to conduct business with them.

Biden Announces New Assistance After Zelenskyy Asks for More US Help 

US Announces More Sanctions on Belarus Leader, Russian Officials

Biden Administration Considers Expediting Resettlement of Ukrainian Refugees with US Connections  

US-North and South Korea 

Two recent North Korean missile launches were tests of a new intercontinental ballistic missile system, according to U.S. officials, who announced fresh sanctions on Pyongyang and warned of a “serious escalation” in tensions. The launches on Feb. 26 and March 4 did not demonstrate ICBM range but were likely meant to evaluate the new system before conducting a future test at full range, potentially disguised as a space launch.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price called the launches “a clear violation of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions” and said they demonstrated “the threat that is posed by the DPRK’s illicit weapons” and missile programs.

South Korea elected main opposition People Power Party candidate and ex-prosecutor Yoon Seok-youl as the country’s next leader. Yoon, a conservative, is expected to take a hardline approach toward North Korea. The State Department congratulated President-elect Yoon and said Washington looked forward to expanding its “ironclad” alliance with Seoul.

North Korea Tested ICBM System, US Says, Warning of ‘Serious Escalation’ 

US Congratulates South Korea’s President-Elect on Win 

US-Iran-Iraq

Iran has claimed responsibility for a missile barrage that struck early Sunday (March 13) near a sprawling U.S. consulate complex in the northern Iraqi city of Irbil, saying it was retaliation for an Israeli strike in Syria that killed two members of its Revolutionary Guard.

No injuries were reported in the attack, which marked a significant escalation between the U.S. and Iran. Hostility between the longtime foes has often played out in Iraq, whose government is allied with both countries. 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he spoke with both Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi and Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq Masrour Barzani to “express solidarity and condemn the recent Iranian attack that violated Iraq’s sovereignty.” Blinken also discussed Iraqi national unity and Kurdish unity, as well as the need to form a government that protects Iraqis and their territory.

Iran Claims Missile Barrage Near US Consulate in Iraq   

US-Afghan

The Afghan embassy and two consulates in the United States will cease operations at noon March 23. Officials from the U.S. State Department met Afghan diplomats on Monday (March 14) to inform them about what they call an “orderly shutdown of operation” of the three Afghan missions.

The move comes seven months after the fall of the former Afghan government in Kabul and several months of administrative and diplomatic wrangling in Washington.

Under the shutdown plan, the State Department’s Office of Foreign Missions will take over the protection and preservation of the embassy in Washington and the consulates in New York and Los Angeles.

Afghan Diplomatic Missions in US Close, Remain Open Elsewhere

Meanwhile, the U.S. special envoy for Afghan women, Rina Amiri, says women’s rights in Afghanistan “suffered a tremendous setback” after the Taliban seized power in August, but that supporting Afghan women is “one area where there is solidarity” in the United States and international community.

US Envoy Appeals for International Support for Afghan Women

Women of Courage 

The United States honored 12 women from Colombia, Iraq, Libya, Myanmar, Vietnam and other countries, with the State Department saying they have demonstrated leadership and a willingness to sacrifice for others at an “International Women of Courage Award” ceremony Monday (March 14) in Washington.

Jailed Vietnamese journalist Pham Doan Trang did not attend the virtual award ceremony, since she is currently in prison.  “We condemn her unjust imprisonment. We call for her immediate release,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken.  

Ei Thinzar Maung, a pro-democracy leader from Myanmar, was honored for her commitment to democracy and work for a strong, inclusive and democratic Myanmar that respects human rights.

“We are not going to ever give up. Democracy must be restored,” said Ei Thinzar Maung in a pre-taped message. While being forced into hiding due to torture and death threats, Ei Thinzar Maung continues to speak out against a military coup that toppled the democratically elected government of Myanmar on Feb. 1, 2021.

Pro-democracy Leaders, Jailed Journalist Among US ‘Women of Courage’ Honorees
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Taiwanese citizens and their government are sending donations to war-torn Ukraine as a show of extra sympathy, analysts say. They argue that many on the Asian Pacific island fear they could become the next place to be targeted by a major military power.

China claims the island as part of its territory and has not renounced use of force, if needed, to bring it under the Chinese flag. Most Taiwanese oppose any formal unification with China. Their dispute goes back to the Chinese civil war of the 1940s, when Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists lost to Communists and rebased in Taiwan.

Since mid-2020, the more militarily powerful China has flown air force planes almost daily over a corner of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone. Taiwan has followed up with orders for modern weaponry, both built onshore and sourced from the United States.

“To be attacked this way and through rather unfair means makes people feel a sense of compassion and empathy (toward Ukraine). So, Taiwanese are quite willing to donate aid,” said Ku Chung-hua, a standing board member in Taipei with the advocacy group Citizens’ Congress Watch.

On February 28, the Taiwan government sent 27 tons of medical supplies to Ukraine.

As of March 7, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Taiwan had massed donations of $10.5 million through a special account. A Taiwan government office in Poland and Poland’s reciprocal office in Taipei will coordinate delivery of the funds to a refugee agency approved by the Polish government, the ministry says.

Some 1,730 Taiwanese donors have, so far, marshaled cookies, blankets, masks, diapers and feminine hygiene products for Ukrainian war refugees, the ministry in Taipei said on its website. The ministry is taking in-kind donations through March 18.

Taiwan’s super-wealthy, church groups and overseas advocacy organizations have collected additional donations, according to the island’s media outlets as well as individual donors.

Joanna Lei, CEO of the Chunghua 21st Century Think Tank in Taiwan, donated through her Taipei-based Protestant church, which happens to follow humanitarian causes. She said the church decided on day three of the Ukraine invasion to donate several million Taiwan dollars. Taiwanese have a record of donating to humanitarian causes, Lei said. Among them were the March 2011 tsunami in Japan and the 2008 earthquake in southwestern China.

Some Taiwanese have kicked in support because of “so many discussions in the international media about Ukraine today and Taiwan tomorrow,” she added. “If we say solidarity, it makes Russia and China allies,” Lei said. “It’s not solidarity, but humanitarian concerns.”

Taiwan political activist Koo Kwang-ming donated $1 million to humanitarian relief, Taiwan-based Liberty Times said. He told the Chinese-language news outlet that Russia had attacked without a “legitimate reason.”

Among the vibrant Taiwanese population of Los Angeles, four advocacy groups are recruiting donations. Ken Wu, vice president of the Los Angeles chapter of the Formosan Association for Public Affairs, pitched in $100 on February 26 and is considering whether to make another donation. Taiwanese donors throughout North America interpret Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as being “about the free world versus China and Russia,” he said.

“Now the Taiwanese people, I think, they have moved beyond the fright of China,” said Wu, whose organization lobbies Congress to take pro-Taiwan action.

“They’re feeling a bit more confident that if they stand behind Ukraine now and save Ukraine, they will be able to stop the aggression once and for all,” he said. “This is a really good lesson for the Chinese to see the cost of an aggressor.”

Ukrainian and Russian delegations opened their fourth round of peace talks Monday after Russia ordered a deadly missile attack on a western Ukraine military base 25 kilometers from NATO-member Poland. At least 35 people were killed and 134 were hurt.

“No doubt people in Taiwan feel a special sympathy for Ukrainians, whose situation has many similarities with that of Taiwan’s people,” said Denny Roy, senior fellow at the East-West Center think tank in Honolulu. “In the background, Taiwan also wants to show that it did what it could to help another invaded people free, in case Taiwan ever finds itself similarly pleading for the international community’s help against an aggressor.”

Taiwanese are backing Ukraine now for the same reasons they sympathized with Hong Kong during the Chinese territory’s 2019 anti-government protests, Ku said. He said they wanted then to protect freedoms that they enjoy in Taiwan and felt were under fire in Hong Kong.

Hardly anyone in Taiwan backs Russia and many Taiwanese feel respect for Ukrainians for fighting back against Moscow’s forces, Ku said. “They feel Ukrainians’ courage is respectable and of value,” he said.

China has rejected parallels between its intentions for Taiwan and Russia’s war in Ukraine. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told a news conference earlier this month that the situations are “not at all comparable” because Taiwan is a “domestic matter,” according to the state-run China Daily news website.
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Novak Djokovic will be allowed to play at the French Open even if he is not vaccinated against COVID-19 as long as the coronavirus situation in France remains stable, organizers said Wednesday.

Russian tennis players, including top-ranked Daniil Medvedev, will also be admitted to play in the tournament but as neutral athletes because of the war started by their country in neighboring Ukraine.

Organizers said there is nothing at the moment preventing Djokovic from defending his title at the clay-court Grand Slam. France this week lifted measures requiring the need to wear face masks in most settings and allowing people who aren’t vaccinated back into restaurants, sports arenas and other venues.

“At this stage there is nothing to stop him returning to the courts,” French Open director Amelie Mauresmo said at a news conference.

Djokovic was deported from Australia in January after a legal battle over whether he should be allowed to enter the country, forcing him to miss the Australian Open. He told the BBC last month that he was willing to miss upcoming Grand Slam tournaments as well if they required him to get vaccinated.

Djokovic has won the French Open twice and has a total of 20 major titles, one short of the record held by Rafael Nadal after the Spaniard won this year’s Australian Open.

French tennis federation president Gilles Moretton said that although Djokovic is now free to play, French authorities might be forced to introduce new restrictions if the virus situation deteriorates before the tournament starts on May 22.

“It is not up to us,” Moretton said. “Today there is a little virus that is going around. We are quite confident that the lights are green, but we are all cautious about what has happened over the last two years.”

Asked whether Russian tennis players will be allowed to compete at the tournament in the light of the war in Ukraine, organizers said they plan to stick to decisions suspending Russia and ally Belarus but allowing their players to compete as neutral athletes.

The seven groups that run the sport around the world have condemned the war; canceled events in Russia and Belarus; kicked those two nations out of the Billie Jean King Cup and Davis Cup team competitions; and announced on March 1 that players from those countries will be allowed to compete in WTA, ATP and Grand Slam tournaments but not under the name or flag of Russia or Belarus.

“We are holding this line,” said Amelie Oudea-Castera, the French tennis federation director general.

Other sports, including track and field, soccer and figure skating, have barred Russian and Belarusian athletes from competition.

Wimbledon organizers are having conversations with the British government about whether Russian players should be allowed to compete at the grass-court tournament this year if they don’t distance themselves from President Vladimir Putin.

Oudea-Castera said French organizers don’t plan to start a detailed and individualized analysis of players’ individual situations, which “can be extraordinarily dependent on the family situations experienced by each of them.”

Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, the day Medvedev was assured of moving atop the ATP rankings for the first time while competing at the Mexico Open.

“Watching the news from home, waking up here in Mexico, was not easy,” Medvedev said then. “By being a tennis player, I want to promote peace all over the world. We play in so many different countries; I’ve been in so many countries as a junior and as a pro. It’s just not easy to hear all this news. … I’m all for peace.”
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In response to Russian invasion, NATO defense ministers, heads of state to discuss increasing security preparations
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Full developments of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine    
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Russia said on Tuesday it has written guarantees it can carry out its work as a party to the Iran nuclear deal, suggesting Moscow could allow a revival of the tattered 2015 pact to go forward. 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s comments appeared to signal Moscow may have backed off its previous view that Western sanctions imposed on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine were an impediment to salvaging the nuclear deal. 

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters a revival of the nuclear deal would not be “an escape hatch” for Russia to avoid sanctions imposed because of the Ukraine war. 

“We of course would not sanction Russian participation in nuclear projects that are part of resuming full implementation of the JCPOA. We can’t and we won’t, and we have not provided assurances beyond that to Russia,” Price added. 

On March 5, Lavrov unexpectedly demanded sweeping guarantees that Russian trade with Iran would not be affected by the Ukraine-related sanctions — a demand Western powers have said was unacceptable and Washington has insisted it will not accept. 

Under the deal, formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Iran agreed to limit its nuclear program to make it harder to develop a nuclear bomb — an ambition it denies — in return for relief from global economic sanctions. 

“We have received written guarantees – they are included in the very text of the agreement on reviving the JCPOA, and in these texts there is a reliable defense of all the projects provided for by the JCPOA and those activities – including the linking up of our companies and specialists,” Lavrov said. 

Speaking at a news conference with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian in Moscow, Lavrov also denied that Russia was an obstacle to reviving the 2015 agreement. 

“I have heard how the Americans have every day tried to accuse us of delaying the agreement – that is a lie. The agreement is not finally approved in several capitals, and the Russian capital – Moscow – is not one of them.” 

Oil prices fell more than 6%, pulled down by Lavrov’s comments that Moscow was in favor of the nuclear deal resuming as soon as possible, and by doubts about Chinese demand following surging COVID-19 cases in China.  

However, Western officials said they were not sure if Russia was satisfied by guarantees it could carry out nuclear projects under the 2015 deal or if it wanted the “right to free and full trade, economic and investment cooperation and military-technical cooperation” with Iran that Lavrov sought on March 5. 

Another U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, responded cautiously to Lavrov’s comments, saying they might mean Moscow had come around to the U.S. view that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine should not torpedo the Iran nuclear deal. 

“Perhaps it is now clear to Moscow that, as we have said publicly, the new Russia-related sanctions are unrelated to the JCPOA and should not have any impact on its implementation,” said this senior U.S. State Department official. 

Eleven months of fitful talks to revive the deal — which then-U.S. President Donald Trump abandoned in 2018, prompting Tehran to start violating its nuclear limits about a year later — paused in Vienna last week after Russia demanded assurances. 

Iran said the United States lacked the “political will” to resolve several outstanding issues in the nuclear negotiations in Vienna. The Islamic Republic has insisted Washington remove human rights and terrorism-related sanctions, including those imposed in 2019 on its elite Revolutionary Guards. 

Amirabdollahian said the pause in the Vienna talks could help resolve several of the outstanding issues and suggested that Russia was no impediment. 

“If we can reach an understanding with the United States on the few issues that are our red line and get to a final agreement, Russia will stand with us until the end of talks to reach a good, stable and strong nuclear deal,” he said. 

 
…

U.S. President Joe Biden will travel next week to Brussels, where he will join an “extraordinary” NATO summit set to take place on March 24 — one month after Russia invaded neighboring Ukraine.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki announced Biden’s travel plans hours after NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called for the meeting, tweeting that alliance members “will address Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, our strong support for Ukraine, and further strengthening NATO’s deterrence & defense.”

Russian shelling hit Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, early Tuesday, including one that struck an apartment building, killing four people and starting a fire that sparked a frenzied rescue effort, officials said. Kyiv Mayor Vitaly Klitschko announced a 35-hour curfew for the city beginning Tuesday night.

Hours earlier, Fox News reported that video journalist Pierre Zakrzewski was killed when the vehicle in which he was traveling was struck by incoming fire on the outskirts of Kyiv.

Despite Russia’s attacks on Kyiv, three European leaders headed to the capital as Russian forces bombarded the area and other cities nearly three weeks into the invasion.

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said he was traveling to Kyiv on Tuesday along with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa to represent the European Council in a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal.

“The purpose of the visit is to confirm the unequivocal support of the entire European Union for the sovereignty and independence of Ukraine,” Fiala said. “The aim of this visit is also to present a broad package of support for the Ukraine and Ukrainians.”

“In such critical times for the world, it is our duty to be where history is forged,” Morawiecki wrote on Facebook. “Because it’s not about us, but about the future of our children who deserve to live in a world free from tyranny.”

The European Union announced a new round of sanctions against Russia, including bans on transactions with certain state-owned companies or new investments in Russia’s energy sector, as well as tighter trade restrictions on iron, steel and luxury goods.

There are also sanctions targeting “key oligarchs, lobbyist and propagandists pushing the Kremlin’s narrative on the situation in Ukraine, as well as key companies in the aviation, military and dual use, shipbuilding and machine-building sectors.”

Much of the international response has been focused on punishing Russia through economic sanctions. Japan Tuesday announced new asset freezes for 17 Russians, including 11 members of the Russian parliament, billionaire Viktor Vekselberg and family members of banker Yuri Kovalchuk.

Russia on Tuesday announced that Biden and a dozen other senior officials have been banned from entering the country, in response to the sanctions from Western countries.

“We’ve made President Putin’s war of choice a strategic failure,” Psaki said Tuesday. “The unprecedented costs we’ve imposed with allies and partners have reversed 30 years of economic progress, something President Putin himself pushed for.”

Negotiators from Russia and Ukraine began more talks Tuesday following a meeting on Monday, held by video rather than in person in neighboring Belarus like previous sessions, which yielded no major signs of a breakthrough.

But Zelenskyy suggested a compromise on Tuesday, saying in a video message that Kyiv was ready to accept security guarantees that fall short of its goal to join NATO.

“If we cannot enter through open doors, then we must cooperate with the associations with which we can, which will help us, protect us … and have separate guarantees,” Zelenskyy said.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said it was premature to predict whether the peace talks will lead to progress.

“The work is difficult, and in the current situation, the very fact that (the talks) are continuing is probably positive,” Peskov said.

Psaki told reporters the United States supports the negotiations, but that it is looking for signs that Russia is willing to pair talks with a pullback in violence.

“Our view continues to be that despite words that are said in these talks or coming out of these talks, diplomacy requires engaging in good faith to de-escalate,” Psaki said Monday.

“And what we’re really looking for is evidence of that. And we’re not seeing any evidence, at this point, that President Putin is doing anything to stop the onslaught or de-escalate.”

Meanwhile, Biden Tuesday signed an appropriations package that includes $13.6 billion for emergency military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine. That will be followed Wednesday by an address to Congress by Zelenskyy, who has appealed for international help, including a no-fly zone over Ukraine, that the Biden administration has ruled out.

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said the government hoped to be able to open nine humanitarian corridors Tuesday to evacuate civilians and deliver aid to those in areas besieged by Russian forces, including the southern city of Mariupol where Russian shelling prevented deliveries on Monday.

In a rare positive development Monday, Ukrainian officials in Mariupol said a convoy of civilian cars was able to leave after many previous attempts to evacuate civilians collapsed. Officials said 160 cars left in the first two hours that the corridor was open. On Tuesday, the city council said 2,000 civilian cars had left, but it was not immediately clear if the 160 cars that left on Monday were included in the tally.

Also Tuesday, Ukraine’s parliament voted to extend martial law for another month until April 24, barring men between 18 and 60 from leaving the country so they can be called to join the military.

The United Nations said Tuesday the number of people who have fled Ukraine since the invasion began had reached 3 million.

Eastern European chief Myroslava Gongadze, White House correspondent Anita Powell, senior diplomatic correspondent Cindy Saine, national security correspondent Jeff Seldin, U.N. correspondent Margaret Besheer, State Department correspondent Nike Ching, and Mandarin service reporters Lin Yang and Si Yang contributed to this report.

Some information also came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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British Iranian aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has had her British passport returned, British lawmaker Tulip Siddiq said on Tuesday, as Tehran and London pressed on with talks about a long-standing 400-million-pound ($520 million) debt.

“I am very pleased to say that Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been given her British passport back,” Siddiq, who is the member of parliament for where Zaghari-Ratcliffe used to live in London, said on Twitter.

“She is still at her family home in Tehran. I also understand that there is a British negotiating team in Tehran right now,” she added on Twitter. Reuters was unable to ascertain if a British team of negotiators was in Tehran nor what the subject of any discussion would be.

A spokesperson for Siddiq’s office told Reuters the lawmaker had based her remarks on information from Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s family.

Separately, her lawyer Hojjat Kermani, when asked whether Zaghari-Ratcliffe will be released, told Reuters: “I am hopeful that we will have good news soon.”

Kermani said his view was based on meetings and discussions he had had with the Iranian judiciary about the case of the Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation who was arrested at a Tehran airport in April 2016 and later convicted by an Iranian court of plotting to overthrow the clerical establishment.

Her family and the foundation, a charity that operates independently of Thomson Reuters and its news subsidiary Reuters, deny the charge.

Asked by a reporter whether he saw signs of optimism on Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s case, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson replied that discussions about it were continuing.

“I don’t want to tempt fate but clearly the negotiations about all our difficult consular cases have been going on for a long time and really I think it would not be sensible for me to comment until we have got a final result,” he said.

Asked for comment, a spokesperson for Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office said: “We have long called for the release of unfairly detained British nationals in Iran. We don’t comment on speculation.”

The Thomson Reuters Foundation declined immediate comment on Siddiq’s statement. Richard Ratcliffe did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Iranian officials did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the remarks by Siddiq and Kermani.

Reuters was unable to independently establish the status of Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

The Thomson Reuters Foundation said that she had traveled to Iran in a personal capacity and had not been doing work in Iran. The Thomson Reuters Foundation is a charity organization that is independent of Thomson Reuters and operates independently of Reuters News.

Iran’s clerical rulers say Britain owes the money that Iran’s Shah paid up front for 1,750 Chieftain tanks and other vehicles, almost none of which were eventually delivered after the Islamic Revolution of 1979 toppled the U.S.-backed leader.

While the British and Iranian governments have said there is no connection between the debt and the case of Zaghari-Ratcliffe, Iranian state media in 2021 reported unidentified Iranian officials saying she would be freed once the debt was paid. Read full story

Iranian officials did not comment when asked whether the amount has been paid by Britain as reported by some Iranian outlets.

Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who served most of her first sentence in Tehran’s Evin prison, was released in March 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic and kept under house arrest at her parents’ home in Tehran. In March 2021, she was released from house arrest but she was summoned to court again on the new charge.

In April 2021, she was then sentenced to a new term in jail on charges of propaganda against Iran’s ruling system, charges she denies. However that sentence has not yet started and she is banned from leaving the country.
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China says it does not want to get caught up in the diplomatic and economic blowback Russia is facing from Western nations over its invasion of Ukraine.

State media said Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi expressed his government’s wishes during a lengthy phone conversation Monday with Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares.

According to a transcript of the phone call published Monday by the Chinese foreign ministry, Wang told Albares that Beijing is “not a party to the crisis” and does not want to be “affected” by the mounting economic sanctions imposed on Moscow over the nearly 3-week-old invasion.

The conversation took place as U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and officials from the National Security Council and State Department met in Rome with China’s top foreign policy adviser, Yang Jiechi. The Biden administration has warned that Beijing would face severe “consequences” if it helps Moscow avoid sanctions.

Media reports emerged Sunday that Moscow has requested military and economic assistance from China for its war in Ukraine.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian Tuesday repeated an accusation leveled by Beijing that the United States is spreading “disinformation” over reports that China has responded positively to Moscow’s request.

Zhao calls the reports “not only unprofessional, but also immoral and irresponsible.”

He told reporters China’s position is “completely objective, impartial and constructive.”

State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters Monday that the United States is watching very closely the extent to which China, or any other country, provides any form of support to Russia.

“We have communicated very clearly to Beijing that we won’t stand by, we will not allow any country to compensate Russia for its losses,” he said.

CNN reported late Monday that the United States told European and Asian allies in a diplomatic cable that China had indicated a willingness to help Russia in the war against Ukraine. CNN said the cable did not state definitively that assistance had been provided and that it warned that China would likely deny any such offer.

Chinese arms sales to Russia would have “a devastating impact on the U.S.-China relationship, because it would clearly align the Chinese with the Russians, against the United States, Europe in a war,” Robert Ross, a political science professor at Boston College, told VOA.

China is in a unique position because of its partnership agreement with Russia, according to Stephen Roach, a senior fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs. He told VOA that China has “considerably greater” leverage over Russia than even Western countries that have implemented “unprecedented sanctions” on Russia.

“China has something that the West does not have, and that is the partnership,” with Russia, he said.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Agence France Presse.
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Millions of Ukrainians have now fled their country, mostly to Poland, but also to Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and Moldova. In Hungary, there are reports of some Ukrainians deciding to turn back. Jon Spier narrates this report from Gabor Ancsin on Hungary’s border with Ukraine. Video editor – Jon Spier.
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White House says ‘no evidence’ Russia willing to pair diplomacy with de-escalation 
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The battle over Ukraine’s fate is happening on multiple fronts, with U.S. officials flying around the globe to meet with civilians who have been affected by the carnage, but also speaking virtually and in person with officials from other countries who have a role to play in ending this conflict. VOA’s Anita Powell reports from the White House, with reporting from Eastern Europe Bureau Chief Myroslava Gongadze in Warsaw.
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Two months after the Berlin Wall fell, another powerful symbol opened its doors in the middle of Moscow: a gleaming new McDonald’s. 

It was the first American fast-food restaurant to enter the Soviet Union, reflecting the new political openness of the era. For Vlad Vexler, who as a 9-year-old waited in a two-hour line to enter the restaurant near Moscow’s Pushkin Square on its opening day in January 1990, it was a gateway to the utopia he imagined the West to be. 

“We thought that life there was magical, and there were no problems,” Vexler said. 

So, it was all the more poignant for Vexler when McDonald’s announced it would temporarily close that store and nearly 850 others in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. McDonald’s Russian website on Monday read, “Due to operational, technical and logistical difficulties, McDonald’s will temporarily suspend service at its network enterprises from March 14.” 

“That McDonald’s is a sign of optimism that in the end didn’t materialize,” said Vexler, a political philosopher and author who now lives in London. “Now that Russia is entering the period of contraction, isolation and impoverishment, you look back at these openings and think about what might have been.” 

McDonald’s said in a statement that “at this juncture, it’s impossible to predict when we might be able to reopen our restaurants in Russia.” But it is continuing to pay its 62,500 Russian employees. The company said this week that it expects the closures to cost around $50 million per month. 

Outside a McDonald’s in Moscow last week, student Lev Shalpo bemoaned the closure. 

“It’s wrong because it was the only affordable place for me where I could eat,” he said. 

Just as McDonald’s paved the way for other brands to enter the Soviet market, its exit led to a cascade of similar announcements from other U.S. brands. Starbucks closed its 130 outlets in Russia. Yum Brands closed its 70 company-owned KFC restaurants and was negotiating the closure of 50 Pizza Huts that are owned by franchisees. 

McDonald’s entry into the Soviet Union began with a chance meeting. In 1976, McDonald’s loaned some buses to organizers of the 1980 Moscow Olympics who were touring Olympic venues in Montreal, Canada. George Cohon, then the head of McDonald’s in Canada, took the visitors to McDonald’s as part of the tour. That same night, the group began discussing ways to open a McDonald’s in the Soviet Union. 

Fourteen years later, after Soviet laws loosened and McDonald’s built relationships with local farmers, the first McDonald’s opened in downtown Moscow. It was a sensation. 

On its opening day, the restaurant’s 27 cash registers rang up 30,000 meals. Vexler and his grandmother waited in a line with thousands of others to enter the 700-seat store, entertained by traditional Russian musicians and costumed characters like Mickey Mouse. 

“The feeling was, ‘Let’s go and see how Westerners do things better. Let’s go and see what a healthy society has to offer,'” Vexler said. 

Vexler saved money for weeks to buy his first McDonald’s meal: a cheeseburger, fries and a Coca-Cola. The food had a “plasticky goodness” he had never experienced before, he said. 

Eileen Kane visited the original McDonald’s often in 1991 and 1992 when she was an exchange student at Moscow State University. She found it a striking contrast from the rest of the country, which was suffering frequent food shortages as the Soviet Union collapsed. 

“McDonald’s was bright and colorful, and they never ran out of anything. It was like a party atmosphere,” said Kane, who is now a history professor at Connecticut College in New London, Connecticut. 

McDonald’s entry into the Soviet Union was so groundbreaking it gave rise to a political theory. The Golden Arches Theory holds that two countries that both have McDonald’s in them won’t go to war, because the presence of a McDonald’s is an indicator of the countries’ level of inter-dependence and their alignment with U.S. laws, said Bernd Kaussler, a political science professor at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. 

That theory held until 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea, Kaussler said. 

Kaussler said the number of countries now withdrawing from Russia, and the speed with which they acted, is unprecedented. He thinks some, including McDonald’s, might calculate that it’s unwise to reopen, which would leave Russia more isolated and the world less secure. 

“As the Russian economy is becoming less interdependent with the U.S. and Europe, we basically have fewer domestic economic factors that could mitigate current aggressive policies,” Kaussler said. 

Vexler said the admiration for the West that caused Russians to embrace McDonald’s three decades ago has also shifted. Russians now tend to be more anti-Western, he said. 

Anastasia Chubina visited a McDonald’s in Moscow last week because her child wanted one last meal there. But she was indifferent about its closure, suggesting Russians will get healthier if they stop eating fast food. 

“I think we lived without it before and will live further,” she said. 

Entrepreneur Yekaterina Kochergina said the closure could be a good opportunity for Russian fast-food brands to enter the market. 

“It is sad, but it’s not a big deal. We’ll survive without McDonald’s,” she said. 

 
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Full developments of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine  
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Russian officials have said that they will move to nationalize the assets of Western companies that pull out of their country over its invasion of Ukraine, a decision that will cause significant economic harm to hundreds of businesses while, at least temporarily, preserving the jobs of the tens of thousands of Russians employed by them. 

As of Monday, at least 375 companies had announced some sort of pullback from Russia, according to a list maintained by the School of Management at Yale University. The list includes companies that have cut ties with Russia completely, as well as those that have suspended operations there while attempting to preserve the option to return. 

According to multiple media reports, dozens of Western companies have been contacted by prosecutors in Russia with warnings that their assets, including production facilities, offices, and intellectual property, such as trademarks, may be seized by the government if they withdraw from the country. 

Endorsed by Putin 

Russian President Vladimir Putin last week endorsed the proposed seizure of Western assets, a plan that was originally aired by a senior member of United Russia, the country’s dominant political party. 

United Russia’s proposal went beyond asset seizures, advocating a policy of arresting executives of foreign business who criticize the actions of the Russian government. According to Reuters, another proposal under consideration would target public companies if more than 25% of their shares are held by individuals from “unfriendly states.” A bill put forward by United Russia legislators would allow the government to force such firms into “external administration,” leading to the elimination of existing shareholder rights and the auctioning of new shares recognized by the Russian government. 

On Twitter last week, White House press secretary Jen Psaki warned that Russia could face further sanctions or legal action if it goes forward with the nationalization plan. “Any lawless decision by Russia to seize the assets of these companies will ultimately result in even more economic pain for Russia,” she wrote. 

New sort of expropriation 

There is a long history of governments expropriating the assets of foreign firms, but experts said that what Russia is threatening falls outside the typical pattern. In the past, governments have nationalized foreign businesses in the name of ideology, as Cuba did in the wake of the Communist revolution there, or because they want to capture the revenue going to private enterprise, as with Iran in the nationalization of its oil industry in 1951. 

Elisabeth Braw, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told VOA that is not what is happening in Russia. 

“It’s not about Russia saying, ‘Well, we think we can run these companies better on our own,'” she said. “It’s really about punishing those companies, which makes it so different from various revolutionary governments that have seized Western companies’ assets in the past.” 

In other cases of nationalization, Braw said, the government seizing assets typically did so strategically. They chose business sectors, at least in part, based on the assumption that they had, or could quickly develop, the capacity to operate them independently. 

But Russia’s threat of blanket nationalization of foreign companies that leave the country would effectively put the Kremlin into the role of operating everything from McDonald’s fast-food franchises to Gillette razor factories to Mercedes-Benz car manufacturing plants. 

Success unlikely 

Experts said that Russia is likely to have a difficult time finding people with the expertise to run many of the foreign firms that might be subject to nationalization. The management ranks of most non-Russian firms have historically been heavily weighted with expatriates, many of whom have been rushing to get out of the country. 

“Some businesses, some manufacturing operations, might well fit the Russian model,” James O’Rourke, a professor of Management at the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business, told VOA. 

Certain kinds of companies, he said, “might be run by an oligarch or a friend of the regime, and it might work out. But I don’t think most of them will.” 

O’Rourke said that even if Russia were able to find the managers needed to keep foreign businesses running, supply chain problems may prove insurmountable. McDonald’s, for example, sources its produce and baked goods from multiple different countries, most of which are actively engaged in the international effort to cut off trade with Russia. Gillette’s manufacturing facilities in Russia use machines made in the U.S. and Germany, which will be unwilling to supply spare parts. 

Political benefits 

The Russian government might be able to score a short-term public relations victory with its own people if it can portray the nationalization of Western businesses as an effort to retain jobs that might otherwise have been lost, said Braw, of the American Enterprise Institute. 

However, she said, unless the Kremlin can find a way to successfully perpetuate the companies’ operations without Western expertise or supplies, the PR benefits of nationalization are likely to be short-lived. 

 
…

An anti-war protester interrupted the main news program on Russian state TV Channel One on Monday, holding up a sign behind the studio presenter with slogans denouncing the war in Ukraine.

The sign, in English and Russian, read: “NO WAR. Stop the war. Don’t believe propaganda. They are lying to you here.” Another phrase, which looked like “Russians against war,” was partly obscured.

The extraordinary protest took place on day 19 of the war that began when Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24 in what it calls a special military operation.

“Stop the war. No to war,” the woman protester could be heard shouting, as the news anchor continued to read from her teleprompter.

The protester could be seen and heard for several seconds before the channel switched to a different report to remove her from the screen.

“Wow, that girl is cool,” Kira Yarmysh, spokesperson for jailed opposition leader Alexey Navalny, wrote on Twitter.

She posted a video of the incident, which quickly racked up nearly 180,000 views.

State TV is the main source of news for many millions of Russians and closely follows the Kremlin line that Russia was forced to act in Ukraine to demilitarize and “denazify” the country, and to defend Russian speakers there against “genocide.” Ukraine and most of the world have condemned that as a false pretext for an invasion of a democratic country.

The woman was named by OVD-Info, an independent protest-monitoring group, and by the head of the Agora human rights group, as Marina Ovsyannikova, an employee of the channel.

Pavel Chikov, head of Agora, said she had been arrested and taken to a Moscow police station.

Tass said she may face charges under a law against discrediting the armed forces, citing a law enforcement source.

On March 4, Russia’s parliament passed a law making public actions aimed at “discrediting” Russia’s army illegal and banning the spread of fake news, or the “public dissemination of deliberately false information about the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.” The offense carries a jail term of up to 15 years.
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The chairperson of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said Monday that Russia’s targeting of Ukrainian civilians, as well as schools and hospitals, is “state terrorism.”

“The invading force started to target the civilian population and infrastructure in an attempt to break the spirit of the Ukrainian people,” Zbigniew Rau said. “This is deplorable and shameful and amounts to state terrorism. Schools, hospitals and kindergartens are being deliberately targeted with internationally banned weapons.”

The United Nations has said it has credible reports that Russian forces are using cluster munitions in populated areas.

Rau, who is Poland’s foreign minister, addressed the U.N. Security Council Monday in his capacity as the chairperson-in-office of the OSCE for 2022.

Russia is an OSCE member, and Rau said Moscow has accused him of bias in response to the conflict.

“I have only one response to this kind of allegation: The impartiality ends where blatant violations of international humanitarian law start,” he said.

Rau urged Russia and Belarus, which is hosting Russian troops on its territory and has been accused of allowing missiles to be fired from its soil, to stop this “cruel endeavor.” He said it serves neither their government nor their people’s interests and will only further isolate both countries internationally.

“The door to diplomacy is still open, and I call on Russia to engage in a meaningful and substantial dialogue to seek a peaceful solution to the current crisis,” Rau said.

Rau said he expects Moscow to honor its international obligations and commitments, adding that any sustainable political solution “must fully respect sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders.”

Russia’s envoy dismissed the OSCE chairperson’s offer for diplomacy, saying he had picked a side in the conflict and was, therefore, not an honest broker.

“The point of the work of the chairperson in office is precisely to solve disagreements between participating states and to bring positions closer; it is in no way to take biased steps which further inflame confrontation, and especially not to head up an anti-Russian campaign in the OSCE,” Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told the council.

Situation worsening on the ground

U.N. political chief Rosemary DiCarlo told the meeting that the situation worsened over the weekend, with Russian forces launching deadly strikes in the west of the country.

“Ukrainian cities are under unrelenting shelling and bombardment, with many civilians killed daily,” she said.

The U.N. human rights office put its verified toll since the start of the conflict at 636 civilians killed and 1,125 injured as of midnight Sunday but acknowledges that it is likely much higher. Meanwhile, nearly 2 million people have become displaced inside the country and 2.8 million have fled to neighboring countries.

“We must not allow any questioning of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders,” DiCarlo added.

Her boss, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, addressed reporters outside of the Security Council chamber. He announced $40 million from the U.N. central emergency response fund for meeting urgent needs in Ukraine, where food, water and medicine are growing scarce.

“This war goes far beyond Ukraine,” he warned of the humanitarian implications.

Guterres said it is threatening food security for millions in the developing world, as Russia and Ukraine are responsible for nearly one-third of the planet’s wheat trade and more than half the world’s supply of sunflower oil for cooking.

“Now their breadbasket is being bombed,” Guterres said.

It is especially concerning for the United Nations, as Ukraine supplies the World Food Program with more than half of its wheat supply. With 41 million people on the brink of famine in 43 countries, a poor or nonexistent harvest from Ukraine will make it much harder to feed them.

The Kyiv government has made repeated appeals for the West to close the skies over Ukraine with a no-fly zone. Asked about this, Guterres said a number of countries have analyzed that possibility, but that it could risk escalating the conflict into a global one.

“It is based on that analysis, that I think we need to be prudent, even if I understand the dramatic appeal of the Ukrainian government,” he said.

The U.N. chief repeated his calls for the war to stop and dialogue to begin.

“We need peace. Peace for the people of Ukraine. Peace for the world,” he said. “We need peace now.”

Meanwhile, the sponsors of a draft Security Council resolution on the humanitarian situation in Ukraine, which has been in negotiation for two weeks, said they will not seek a vote in the council but will take it to the wider membership in the General Assembly.

“Obviously, it would have been difficult in the Security Council, no need to explain to you why,” France’s envoy Nicolas de Riviere said in response to a reporter’s question.

Russia holds a veto in the 15-nation council.

“We think it’s time to take action to move to the General Assembly and have the whole membership supporting an initiative on humanitarian access, on cessation of hostilities, on respect of international humanitarian law, on respect of the Geneva Conventions,” Ambassador de Riviere said. “So we are very optimistic we can do that. The sooner the better. The situation on the ground deteriorates by the hour.”
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