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The German authorities want to confiscate 720 million euros in assets from a Russian bank. Ukraine reports renewed Russian air strikes on Kiev. All developments in the live blog.
The German authorities want to confiscate 720 million euros in assets from a Russian bank. As the Federal Prosecutor’s Office in Karlsruhe announced, a so-called independent confiscation procedure was initiated for the assets located in Frankfurt am Main.
The reason for the planned confiscation is an attempted violation of the sanctions against Russia. The bank tried to withdraw the money to Russia. According to the information, the Federal Prosecutor’s Office applied to the Frankfurt am Main Higher Regional Court to open the proceedings on July 7th. Accordingly, the Russian bank was added to the European Union sanctions list in June 2022. This is associated with the ban on having credit balances with European financial and credit institutions.
Shortly after being included in the list, those responsible at the Russian bank tried to withdraw the more than 720 million euros from Frankfurt. However, the bank there did not carry out the electronic transfer order. The independent confiscation procedure was requested because no specific person could currently be prosecuted or convicted of the crime.
The Russian Orthodox Church’s TV channel Spas is now on the EU sanctions list. The channel spreads “pro-Kremlin propaganda and disinformation about Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine,” says the regulation for the EU’s twelfth sanctions package due to the Russian war.
In his program, Spas justified the military attack on Ukraine with religious and spiritual arguments. The broadcaster supports actions that undermine and threaten the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine, the Council of the European Union continued.
From the perspective of former boxing world champion Wladimir Klitschko, the “free world” needs to be better prepared for wars. “Because evil keeps coming back. And then we have to be able to fight it,” he told the Augsburger Allgemeine.
His country is facing a difficult winter. “Overall, it will become even more complicated to retake the occupied territories,” said the native Ukrainian. “It’s like a boxing match at the moment. We’re over the middle. But there are still many rounds ahead of us. I think the war will last longer than we all expect,” said Klitschko.
Russia attacked Ukrainian cities again overnight with drones and missiles. Nine people were injured in the southern city of Kherson, including four children, as Mayor Roman Mrotschko announced on the Telegram online service. The capital Kiev and the second largest Ukrainian city Kharkiv were also targets of the Russian attacks.
According to the Ukrainian army, a total of 19 Shahed drones were fired from the Russian-annexed Crimean peninsula, 18 of which were destroyed. Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov reported at least two impacts near residential buildings. A transport depot that had already been destroyed in previous Russian attacks was hit, he wrote on Telegram. He did not provide any information about possible victims.
According to the Ukrainian Air Force, the missiles were S300 surface-to-air missiles that were fired from the Russian border region of Belgorod. Moscow has intensified its nightly attacks on Ukrainian cities in recent weeks.
Conflict parties as a source
In the current situation, information on the course of the war, shelling and casualties provided by official bodies of the Russian and Ukrainian parties to the conflict cannot be directly verified by an independent body.
Ukrainian soldiers have accused Russia of using gas in attacks in southern Ukraine, according to a report. In recent weeks there have been cases in the southern Ukrainian region of Zaporizhzhia near Orikhiv in which a corrosive and flammable gas was dropped from drones onto Ukrainian lines, the US television channel CNN reported, citing several soldiers from a Ukrainian front-line unit and an intelligence officer .
The Russians apparently used the gas to cause panic among Ukrainian soldiers before they were fired upon, they said. A paramedic reported nine cases in which gas had been used. This information could not initially be independently verified. Since Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine began almost 22 months ago, there have been concerns that Russia could use poison gas in attacks.
Conflict parties as a source
In the current situation, information on the course of the war, shelling and casualties provided by official bodies of the Russian and Ukrainian parties to the conflict cannot be directly verified by an independent body.
The US Congress will not approve any new military aid for Ukraine, which has been attacked by Russia, this year. The leaders of the ruling Democrats and the opposition Republicans in the Senate, Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell, admitted this in a joint statement. The negotiators from the Chamber of Congress and the government will continue to work on outstanding issues in the coming days, said Schumer and McConnell. The hope is that action can be taken “quickly” at the beginning of next year.
The failure to reach an agreement on new aid to Ukraine before the end of the year does not come as a surprise, but it is a symbolically heavy blow for Ukraine. Especially since President Volodymyr Zelenskyj personally called for new aid during a visit to Washington last week.
According to the military, the Ukrainian capital Kiev has been the target of Russian air strikes for the fifth time this month. “According to preliminary information, there were no injuries and no destruction in the capital,” said the head of the Kiev military administration, Serhiy Popko, on the messaging app Telegram. The Ukrainian air defense destroyed all missiles.
High-ranking US senators do not expect an early agreement on the billions in aid for Ukraine requested by President Biden. According to the Ukrainian army, the situation around the city of Kupyansk is “complicated”. All developments in the live blog.