"I have great hope that an agreement for a ceasefire in Ukraine will be reached this weekend," German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on May 9, shortly before traveling to Kyiv alongside the leaders of France, Poland, and the U.K.
U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will arrive in Kyiv early on May 10.
The United States embassy in Kyiv on May 9 issued a warning that Russia could launch "a potentially significant" attack in the coming days, despite Putin's self-declared Victory Day "truce."
The sanctioned oil tankers have transported over $24 billion in cargo since 2024, according to Downing Street. The U.K. has now sanctioned more shadow fleet vessels than any other country.
Washington and its partners are considering additional sanctions if the parties do not observe a ceasefire, with political and technical negotiations between Europe and the U.S. intensifying since last week, Reuters' source said.
The Kyiv Independent’s contributor Ignatius Ivlev-Yorke spent a day with a mobile team from the State Emergency Service in Nikopol in the south of Ukraine as they responded to relentless drone, artillery, and mortar strikes from Russian forces just across the Dnipro River. Nikopol is located across from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in the city of Enerhodar.
A currency exchange office in Moscow on July 6, 2023. Photo for illustrative purposes. (Natalia Kolesnikova/AFP via Getty Images)
Almost $2.3 billion of dollars and euros have been shipped to Russia since the beginning of the full-scale war, violating sanctions from the U.S. and EU, Reuters reported on Aug. 12.
Both the EU and the U.S. implemented measures in March 2022 banning the export of dollars and euros to Russia. As the trade of dollars and euros subsequently decreased, Chinese yuan has increasingly filled the gap, becoming the most traded foreign currency.
At the same time, the data seen by Reuters indicates that dollars and euros continue to be widely used in Russia.
Much of the cash arrived in Russia via third-party countries such as the United Arab Emirates and Turkey, which have declined to join in such currency-related sanctions against Russia. For more than half of the cash in euros and dollars that arrived in Russia, the origin was not specified. Much of the cash payments went toward gold, arms, or for usage by banks.
Cash payments were often used as a means of circumventing sanctions on wire payments, sources told Reuters.
The data viewed by Reuters covered March 2022 through December 2023.
The U.S. has taken several steps to expand the purview of its sanctions against Russia, aiming to prevent circumvention. The U.S. has begun instituting penalties for banks or other financial institutions that continue to do business in the country, even unwittingly.
The new measures have likely contributed to some Chinese banks' withdrawal from Russia and other associated difficulties with trade between the two countries.
Reuters reported earlier in August that Russia and China have begun discussing barter-based trading as a way to bypass the sanctions-associated payment difficulties.
Rachel Amran
