Russia adds 287 members of UK House of Commons to sanctions list
RUSSIA,UKRAINE: Russia has added 287 members of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom to the sanctions list, the Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.
“In response to the decision of the UK government, made on March 11, to include 386 lawmakers of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation to the sanctions list, on the basis of reciprocity, (the ministry) imposes personal restrictions on 287 members of the House of Commons of the British Parliament,” the ministry said in a statement.
The ministry said that sanctioned individuals are not allowed to enter Russia as they took an active part in imposing anti-Russia sanctions by the UK.
Meanwhile, the Russia-Ukraine conflict has dealt “a major shock” to commodity markets, altering global patterns of trade, production and consumption, the World Bank (WB) said in a report released on Tuesday.
The increase in energy prices over the past two years has been the largest since the year 1973, according to the WB’s latest Commodity Markets Outlook report, Xinhua news agency reported.
Price increases for food commodities, of which Russia and Ukraine are large producers, and fertilisers, which rely on natural gas as a production input, have been the largest since 2008, the report noted.
The report estimated that energy prices are expected to rise more than 50 per cent in 2022 before easing in 2023 and 2024.
The price of Brent crude oil is expected to average $100 a barrel in 2022, its highest level since 2013 and an increase of more than 40 per cent compared to 2021. Prices are expected to moderate to $92 in 2023, still well above the five-year average of $60 a barrel.
Meanwhile, Polish and Bulgarian leaders, on Wednesday, accused Moscow of using natural gas to blackmail their countries after Russia’s state-controlled energy company stopped supplying them with gas. European Union leaders echoed those comments and were holding an emergency meeting on the Russian move.
The gas cutoff to Poland and Bulgaria came after Russian President Vladimir Putin said that “unfriendly” countries would need to start paying for gas in rubles, Russia’s currency, which Bulgaria and Poland refused to do.
– THE STATESMAN, INDIA TODAY