Seattle Daily Star

  Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said he had accepted the apology Russian President Vladimir Putin has apologised to Israel’s Prime Minister Naftali Bennett over anti-Semitic comments made by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Mr Bennett’s office said on Thursday. After a call with the Russian leader, Mr Bennett said he had accepted the apology and thanked Mr Putin “for clarifying his attitude towards the Jewish people and the memory of the Holocaust”. Mr Bennett also said he asked Putin to consider allowing the evacuation of the besieged Azovstal steel works in the Ukrainian port of Mariupol. The Israeli leader said he made that request following an earlier conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and that Mr Putin promised to set up a corridor for civilian evacuation. Mr Lavrov on Sunday caused a row with Israel when he said that Adolf Hitler had “Jewish blood”. In an interview with Italian television news, Russia’s veteran foreign minister al...

  Russian President Vladimir Putin warned of lightning-fast retaliation if countries interfere in Ukraine, while U.S. President Joe Biden was set to comment on Thursday in support of Ukraine’s fight against “Russia’s brutal war”. Russia has told the United States to stop sending arms to Ukraine, saying large Western deliveries of weapons were inflaming the conflict. Addressing lawmakers in St Petersburg on Wednesday, Putin said the West wanted to cut Russia up into different pieces and accused it of pushing Ukraine into conflict with Russia. “If someone intends to intervene in the ongoing events from the outside, and create strategic threats for Russia that are unacceptable to us, they should know that our retaliatory strikes will be lightning-fast,” said Putin, according to video of his address supplied by Russian media. “We have all the tools for this, things no one else can boast of having now. And we will not boast, we will use them if necessary. And I want everyone to know tha...

  Ukrainian leader also called for futher sanctions to be put in place against Moscow Ukraine’s allies have it in their hands to avoid a drawn-out war, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his latest nightly video address, renewing calls for more weapons for his country and to expand sanctions on Russia. “When someone says it will take a year or years, I reply: it is in your hands to make the war significantly shorter,” Mr Zelenskyy said. “The more and the faster we will get all the weapons we asked for, the stronger our positions will be and the sooner peace will come.” He also called on other nations to enforce a ban on Russian oil, to inflict further pressure on the country to end its invasion of Ukraine . He labelled existing sanctions on Russia as “painful” but stressed that they were not enough. In his address, Mr Zelenskyy also said that the situation was “still very difficult” in the south and east of Ukraine. He said that “in the occupied districts of Kherson and Z...

  Ukrainian official decries ‘deliberate attack on the passenger infrastructure of the railway and the residents’ of eastern city; Russia denies responsibility. At least 39 people, including four children, have been killed and nearly 100 wounded in a rocket attack on a railway station in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, according to Ukrainian officials. In an online post on Friday, Donetsk Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko revised an earlier estimate of 30 killed and said many of the 87 wounded were in a serious condition. A Ukrainian intelligence official said four children were among those killed. Ukrainian officials accused Russia over the attack, saying it took place as civilians were at the station in an attempt to evacuate to safer parts of the country. Russia, however, denied any involvement. “Two rockets hit Kramatorsk railway station,” Ukrainian Railways said in a statement. Oleksandr Kamyshin, head of the railway company, called it “a deliberate attack on the passenger infrastructur...

  Ex-UK ambassador says Russian leader cannot win Ukrainians’ support following uproar over mass grave in Bucha President Vladimir Putin ’s ambition to take control of Ukraine and make it part of Russia looks doomed after a string of atrocities, a former British ambassador to Moscow has said. The trail of death, torture and destruction which Russian soldiers left behind when retreating from towns and cities around Kyiv shocked the world and drew international condemnation. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Mr Putin of genocide after a mass grave containing at least 57 bodies was found in Bucha, a city 16 miles north-west of the capital. The remains of five men showing signs of torture were also discovered in the basement of a children’s health centre, Ukraine’s prosecutor general’s office said. “Torture chamber was discovered in a children’s sanatorium in Bucha by prosecutors and Kyiv Regional police officers,” prosecutor Iryna Venediktova said on Twitter. Huma...

 Ukraine is ground zero for the expansion of the U.S.-Russia proxy war. Ever since Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine, there has been an unprecedented cohesion of messaging emanating from the U.S. government, its NATO and other European allies, and large segments of the Western media establishment. As massive quantities of weapons pour into Ukraine, there has been consistent media and political agitation for President Joe Biden and other Western leaders to “do more” or answer for why they are not further escalating the situation, including through the imposition of a no-fly zone. The White House smells Putin’s blood in the waters of his disastrous invasion. The flow of weapons, the sweeping sanctions, and other acts of economic warfare are ultimately aimed not just at defending Ukraine and making the regime pay for the invasion in the immediate present, but also setting in motion its downfall. “For god’s sake, this man cannot remain in power,” Biden said during his re...

  The bank is unable to make payments because of sanctions, UK’s FCA says Russian lender Sberbank said on Friday it was winding down operations at its investment arm in London, which Britain’s financial watchdog said was “operationally unable to make payments” owing to sanctions over the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “Sberbank is ceasing the operation of its London office, Sberbank CIB (UK) Limited. We are in contact with the local regulator, the FCA [Financial Conduct Authority], and in accordance with the law we will close our activities, fulfilling all obligations to our clients,” Sberbank said. It said key members of staff were still working in their current roles. The FCA said it had appointed two people to oversee the administration, a form of creditor protection that often precedes bankruptcy. The regulator said sanctions had caused Sberbank’s investment arm to become “operationally unable to make payments despite the firm having sufficient assets to cover its liabilitie...

  Member countries aim to ‘radically’ reduce Russian oil and gas imports through various measures and policies The International Energy Agency said its members are ready to release more oil into the market “if needed” to tackle soaring prices in the wake of Russia’s military offensive in Ukraine. Members including the US and its allies are discussing a further co-ordinated release of oil from storage to tackle rising prices, the IEA said in a press conference with US energy secretary Jennifer Granholm in Paris. IEA member countries committed to releasing 61.7 million barrels of oil reserves as of March 4, exceeding the 60 million barrels of oil that they had pledged to release from emergency stocks to bring stability to energy markets. The US will provide 30 million barrels followed by Japan with 7.5 million, South Korea with 4.4 million, Germany with 3.2 million and the UK with 2.2 million. “Our member countries and secretariat are closely monitoring the markets and in additi...

  Negotiations between the two sides are ongoing, three weeks after Putin invaded his neighbour Britain’s armed forces minister says Ukraine should not be pressured into making territorial concessions to Russia as part of any peace deal to end the war. James Heappey said the West may have a role to play in brokering an agreement between Kyiv and Moscow, but insisted it would be up to the Ukrainians to decide what terms they could accept. “This can’t go on indefinitely,” he told Sky News. “If the West has a role to play alongside others beyond the region in brokering that peace and offering something the Ukrainians and the Russians can live with, that’s fine.   “What I absolutely don’t think we should do — and I have heard some around the West suggest this — is somehow Ukraine should be pressured to give up the Donbas or to give up its claim on Crimea. “Those are decisions entirely for President Zelenskyy and his government. It is not for the West to trade away Ukrainian sover...