MOSCOW: According to a statement released on Friday by the Russian Finance Ministry, the country will continue to restrict the amount of assets in its National Wealth Fund (NWF) that are denominated in the currencies of “unfriendly” states.
As part of the NWF’s newly approved regulatory asset structure, the statement states that the percentage of non-cash gold and the Chinese yuan in the NWF will rise to 40% and 30%, respectively.
Russia will simultaneously eliminate all dollar assets from its wealth fund and eliminate all British pound and Japanese yen balances.
According to the ministry, these modifications will enable the NWF’s currency composition to better adapt to Russia’s challenges in the current macroeconomic and geopolitical climate.
The General Staff report stated that Russian forces shelled several towns near Kupiansk in the northeast Kharkiv region that Ukraine had captured in September, as well as settlements in Luhansk.
The contested town of Hulyaipole was among the Zaporizhzhia region’s southern regions that were shelled by the Russians. On the opposite side of the Kakhovka reservoir from the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, there was also shelling in and around Ukrainian-held Nikopol.
On the southern front, Russian shelling of Kherson and Kachkarivka, further north on the west bank of the Dnipro River, where Russian forces had left the city a month earlier, continued.
In an earlier statement, Russia’s Defense Ministry stated that it had launched a “massive strike” on energy and military industrial targets to prevent Ukraine from repairing equipment and moving troops.
According to Zelenskyy, the majority of the attacks targeted energy infrastructure.
In the dead of winter, millions of people in Ukraine have been without heat or power as a result of Russia’s nearly weekly mass missile and drone strikes against civil infrastructure since October.
Russia says it wants to make it harder for Ukraine to fight. The attacks, according to Kyiv, are meant to harm civilians.
In a video message for the new year, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu praised the heroism of Russian soldiers and declared that Russia’s victory over Ukraine was “inevitable.” Shoigu stated, “We meet the New Year in a difficult military-political situation.” At a time when those who want to erase our glorious history and great accomplishments are tearing down monuments to those who defeated fascism, putting war criminals on a pedestal, and canceling and desecrating everything Russian.
In a recent effort to encourage support for Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, the authorities announced that soldiers and state employees stationed in Ukraine will not be subject to income tax. All combatants in the four Ukrainian territories that Russia has claimed as its own, despite not having complete control over them, are the subject of the new measure: Kherson, Donetsk, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia.
According to President Vladimir Putin’s modifications to his previous decree regarding gas payments in rubles, countries will be able to pay debt settlements for gas supplies in a foreign currency.
The Head of the International Olympic Committee insisted that Russia and Belarus’ sporting sanctions for their offensive in Ukraine must remain in place in 2023. According to IOC President Thomas Bach, the Olympic Movement stands behind the Ukrainian athletes and wants to see a strong Ukrainian team at the Paris 2024 Games.
After Russia stated that it could leave UEFA and seek membership in Asia’s confederation, the Russian Football Union stated that it wanted its teams to return to international competition. Moscow was excluded from competition by the governing body of European football, UEFA, following President Vladimir Putin’s February deployment of troops to Ukraine. The decision to move to Asia was made at a meeting of the executive committee of the Russian Football Union.
In an effort to take the place of Russian shipments, Bulgaria’s sole nuclear power plant entered into a supply agreement with a French company. The two 1,000-megawatt reactors at the state-owned Kozloduy plant on the Danube currently utilize Russian fuel.
