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"More than 30,000 tons of chemical munitions have been disposed of over nearly three decades. Years behind schedule and several times over budget, the United States’ declared chemical weapons stock is fully destroyed. The last batch of munitions containing sarin gas, a deadly nerve agent, were disarmed on Friday, July 7 at the Blue Grass Chemical Agent-Destruction Pilot Plant in Kentucky. The destruction was verified by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons."... ..."Under the Chemical Weapons Convention, the military was supposed to have eliminated its stockpile in 2007, almost two decades ago. It was granted a five-year extension...

The World Health Organization said Friday that COVID-19 no longer qualifies as a global emergency, marking a symbolic end to the devastating coronavirus pandemic that triggered once-unthinkable lockdowns, upended economies and killed at least 7 million people worldwide. WHO first declared COVID-19 to be an emergency more than three years ago. The U.N. health agency's officials said that even though the emergency phase was over, the pandemic hasn't come to an end, noting recent spikes in cases in Southeast Asia and the Middle East... Tedros said the pandemic had been on a downward trend for more than a year, acknowledging...

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sparked a major market crisis, sending oil and gas prices to multi-decade highs and causing the Euro to crash below parity with the dollar. Today, energy prices have fallen back to pre-war levels, driven lower by fears of a global recession and weak oil demand in China due to Covid outbreaks. Analysts remain divided regarding oil prices in 2023 however, with some analysts believing the return of China and the lack of Russian energy will send prices soaring.

Chinese telecommunications and smartphone giant Huawei Technologies Co is closing down its enterprise business unit in Russia in a further retreat that affects 2,000 jobs... Huawei’s Enterprise Business Group division in Russia, responsible for selling data storage systems and telecommunications equipment to corporate clients, will be disbanded on January 1... The move has been made to avoid the risk of secondary sanctions on the telecoms giant, which is already subject to US trade sanctions, as the systems and equipment could be used by the state, according to the report... ...Several Chinese firms have been caught in the crossfire created by...

Russian crude-oil exports have taken a serious hit since new sanctions and a price cap came into force earlier in the week, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that figures from two data providers on Russian crude both show a big fall, though their magnitudes differ. According to one commodity-analytics firm Kpler, Russia’s seaborne exports fell by nearly 500,000 barrels per day on Tuesday, a 16% decline from the November average of 3.08 million bpd. Meanwhile, TankerTrackers.com, which tracks sea vessels using signals and satellite images, has reported that Russia's crude exports fell by nearly 50%. With shipments from the...

Peru’s President Pedro Castillo announced on Wednesday that he will dissolve Congress temporarily and install an emergency government – hours before lawmakers were due to make an impeachment vote in congress. In a televised speech from the Presidential Palace on Wednesday, Castillo said he will call for early parliamentary elections to work on a new constitution. The embattled president, who has survived two impeachment attempts, also declared a national curfew from Wednesday from 10 p.m. local (5 p.m. ET) to 4 a.m. local. Congress appeared defiant however, beginning its session on Wednesday with lawmakers singing the national anthem. Francisco Morales,...

German gas storage facilities have already exceeded the fill level target of 95 per cent for 1 November. ...According to data from the transparency platform AGSI+, the storage facilities were 98.91 per cent full (as of 31 October).

Russia’s finance ministry has slashed its forecast for taxable oil production for next year, a draft budget seen by Reuters showed on Friday. The draft budget covers the next three years and forecasts a decline in crude oil production and refining as Western sanctions bite... The finance ministry sees Russian oil and gas condensate production... a 7% - 8% decline from... (what) the ministry anticipated this year (after having already adjusted this year's estimate downward)... Expected oil refining volumes were cut by nearly 20%... The refusal of some countries to work with Russia in the oil markets and having to...

Belarus said on Wednesday it was unable to repay its foreign currency-denominated debt due to sanctions imposed on it by the European Union and the United States. The World Bank said on Monday it had placed all loans made by its main lending arm to Belarus into "nonperforming" status effective immediately.

On Monday, Europe’s natural gas prices fell to the lowest level in three months thanks to mild weather and a high level of LNG imports... hitting an intra-day low of $140 per megawatt-hour (down from $350 on August 26th, the lowest since July 1st). Gas storage in the EU is now at more than 90% and the bloc has managed to reduce its gas consumption by 10%.

The European Union is preparing the eighth round of sanctions against Russia as Moscow escalated its war in Ukraine by holding illegal referendums in four Ukrainian regions... On Thursday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen presented the Commission’s proposals for the eighth package of sanctions in response to Russia’s escalation of the war in Ukraine. “Today, in this package, here, we are laying the legal basis for this oil price cap,” von der Leyen said, commenting on the G7-led idea of banning Russian crude oil from imports by sea unless the oil is sold at or below a certain...

Russian exports of crude oil and refined products declined substantially in September... total Russian crude oil exports averaged 3.15 million barrels daily this month, which was down by 280,000 bpd from August (-9%). Crude exports to Europe slumped by 314,000 bpd from August to about 900,000 bpd (-26%). The data shows that crude oil exports to Asia - now Russia’s biggest market - in September were down by more than 250,000 bpd to an average daily of 1.6 million barrels (-14%)... some 187,000 bpd of Russian oil on water still had no fixed destination. Exports of refined oil products declined...

Slovakia's parliament on Tuesday ratified the entry of Finland and Sweden to NATO, becoming one of the last countries to back the military alliance's expansion... NATO's 30 members have been ratifying their entry since accession protocols were signed in July. With Slovakia's vote, only Hungary and Turkey remain to approve the expansion... Hungary's parliament has the motion on Finland and Sweden's NATO membership on its agenda, but no date is set as lawmakers return after a summer recess.

Poland and Norway opened a new gas pipeline via Denmark on Tuesday, hailed as a much-needed alternative to Russian-controlled routes. At a ceremony in Poland, Norway’s Energy Minister Terje Aasland said the opening of Baltic Pipe was “a milestone on the important path towards European independence”... Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said it “marks a crucial geopolitical step for all of us.” “Putin uses Russian energy as a weapon to destabilise Europe, to divide us. He cannot be allowed to succeed,” Ms Frederiksen said, referring to the Russian president. Poland, one of the fiercest advocates in Europe of isolating Moscow,...

Russian natural gas exports to Europe have dropped by more than 82% in one year, according to Spain's Energy Transition Minister Teresa Ribera. "In just a year, the flow of gas from Russia fell by more than 82%. In fact, in January 2021, supplies from Russia accounted for about 40% of the gas consumed in Europe. At the moment, this figure does not reach 10%."

In September, Indian refiners are not expected to buy any ESPO crude from Russia because of the higher shipping rates. African and Middle East crude becomes more attractive as shipping rates on long voyages have jumped... However, with a recent surge in freight rates, Russian oil doesn't look so cheap. Moreover, the travel time from Russia's Far East, where the ESPO grade is loading for exports, is a month to India, compared to a week necessary for a Middle Eastern cargo to reach India... "On net back basis after factoring in the freight, the landed cost of ESPO is turning...

Moscow’s already-eroding influence in Central Asia is set to decline even more rapidly. Vladimir Putin’s stature shrank in Samarkand. At the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Uzbekistan last week, Russia’s beleaguered leader essentially apologized to his Chinese counterpart, faced verbal reprimands from India’s Prime Minister, and waited uncomfortably for the Kyrgyz President to arrive late to a bilateral meeting. The SCO summit provided visual, real-time evidence of Russia’s diminished standing in Central Asia, which has faded due to the Kremlin’s foolish and poorly executed invasion of Ukraine. While Moscow’s already-eroding influence in Central Asia is set to decline even...

Russia and Ukraine exchanged hundreds of prisoners of war after a prisoner exchange was brokered by Turkey and Saudi Arabia. Among them were fighters from the Azovstal plant. Ukraine announced the release of 215 imprisoned soldiers and 10 foreigners from Russia on Thursday. The soliders were released in exchange for 55 Russian prisoners, as well as Victor Medvedchuck, leader of the banned pro-Russia political party in Ukraine. Among the released were fighters who led the defense of Mariupol's Azovstal's steelworks, an act that has been hailed as an icon of Ukrainian resistance... Victor Medvedchuck, who has been said to be...

What’s next? Basically, the war is lost. If you look at all of the objectives that Putin set for the war, all of them have failed. All of them. So, continuing the war is the only way for Putin to stay in power. He wants to create extra chaos in the free world hoping that a new window will open for him. It’s really just a protracted agony. It is cynical and stupid, but Putin is willing to put thousands of civilians into graves in the months to come before the whole of Ukraine is liberated, if that will allow...

Municipal deputies for the Smolninskoye District in St. Petersburg plan to submit a petition to the State Duma (the Russian parliament) to charge Russian president Vladimir Putin with high treason for unleashing the war in Ukraine. Deputy Dmitry Palyuga announced the intention on Twitter. According to Palyuga, “the majority of deputies in attendance supported the decision.” In conversation with The Insider, he specified that seven out of ten voted in favor of the initiative. According to its sponsors, Putin’s actions since the beginning of the “special military operation” fall under Article 93 of the Russian Constitution, which stipulates for the...