International sanctions

The European Union and 12 partner countries have met in Brussels to discuss the effectiveness of Western sanctions on Russia and ways to strengthen the G7 price cap on Russian oil, the EU Commission said on Tuesday.

In the first half of 2024, Western allies, including Bulgaria, the European Union and the United States, purchased around 2 billion dollars worth of oil products from Turkey that were refined from Russian crude oil, according to a report by the Center for the Study of Democracy (CSD) and the Center for Energy and Clean Air (CREA).

The United States has imposed sanctions on ten individuals and two entities from Russia, accusing them of trying to influence the 2024 US presidential election. The US Department of the Treasury described these actions as part of a broader effort to counter Russia's alleged attempts to manipulate public opinion ahead of the November election.

Russia has imposed entry bans on 92 US nationals, including more than two dozen journalists, as announced by the Russian Foreign Ministry on Thursday. The sanctions come in response to what Moscow describes as the Biden administration's "Russophobic policy" aimed at inflicting a "strategic defeat" on Russia, according to state media TASS.

Hungarian state oil company MOL is nearing the conclusion of negotiations to establish a new arrangement for securing Russian crude oil after Ukraine banned its main partner, Lukoil, from using Ukrainian pipelines.

Traders are moving Russian diesel cargoes to a new ship-to-ship (STS) loadings site in the northern Aegean Sea, as Western sanctions hit vessels carrying fuel loaded in Russian ports, LSEG and market sources data show.

Traders are moving Russian diesel cargoes to a new ship-to-ship (STS) loadings site in the northern Aegean Sea, as Western sanctions hit vessels carrying fuel loaded in Russian ports, LSEG and market sources data show.

Gazprom reported a record loss of 480.6 billion rubles (about 5.6 billion US dollars) for the first half of the year. This follows last year's annual loss of 629 billion rubles (approximately 6.9 billion dollars), the first in over two decades. In 2022, Gazprom had recorded a profit of 1.23 trillion rubles.

The European Commission has made its first payment of 1.5 billion euros to Ukraine, derived from frozen Russian assets. This funding aims to bolster Ukraine's military capacity and contribute to the country's reconstruction.

Switzerland is expanding its sanctions against Russia to align with those adopted by the EU on June 24, as announced by the Swiss government. This measure is in response to Moscow's ongoing aggressive actions in Ukraine.