Latest Russia-Ukraine updates: US warns over sanctions busting

Two US nationals have been arrested in Kansas City for sending US aviation technology to Russia, US Commerce Department official Matthew Axelrod said.

The US will announce a new military aid package for Ukraine on Friday, White House national security spokesman John Kirby has told reporters.

Ongoing military aid to Ukraine will be a topic of discussion between Biden and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz when the two leaders meet at the White House also on Friday, Kirby said.

Bangladesh’s foreign minister has said at the G20 meeting in New Delhi that companies making “runaway profit” from the war in Ukraine should compensate less developed countries affected by the conflict.

“In this war, some companies are making runaway profit, … energy companies and the defence companies,” AK Abdul Momen told CNBC on the sidelines of the foreign ministers meeting.

“Therefore, we will argue that those companies that are making runaway profit, they should dedicate at least 20 percent of the profit to those countries that are most affected, like us,” he said without naming specific companies.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has told his Ukrainian counterpart that he will encourage countries to join peace talks to end the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.

“I reaffirmed Brazil’s desire to talk with other countries and participate in any initiative related to building peace and dialogue. War cannot interest anyone,” Lula said on Twitter after a video call with Zelenskyy.

The leftist Brazilian leader has advocated the creation of a group of countries that could mediate a peaceful solution to the war.

The US is not providing Ukraine with intelligence for targets inside Russia, the Pentagon says, calling such Russian accusations “nonsense”.

“I don’t have any information in regards to whether or not the Ukrainians have conducted these type of operations. I’d refer you to them,” Pentagon spokesman Brigadier General Pat Ryder told reporters.

“I can say definitively that the notion of the US providing intelligence or information to the Ukrainians to target locations inside Russia is nonsense. We are not at war with Russia nor do we seek war with Russia,” Ryder said.

Biden will host European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen for talks in Washington on March 10, the White House says.

The two leaders will talk about their “strong cooperation” in supporting Ukraine and fighting the climate crisis as well as challenges posed by China, the White House said in a statement.

The US government has called on companies to ensure they comply with Russia-related sanctions, warning that a failure to do so could lead to potential prosecution or enforcement actions.

“Given the proliferation of sanctions and export controls imposed in response to Russia’s unjust war, multinational companies should be vigilant in their compliance efforts and be on the lookout for possible attempts to evade US laws,” the departments of Justice, Commerce and Treasury said in a joint notice.

“Businesses of all stripes should act responsibly by implementing rigorous compliance controls.”

A Russian regional politician will appear in court next week to face accusations that he discredited the armed forces by posting a video of himself listening to Putin’s state of the nation speech with spaghetti draped over his ear.

Mikhail Abdalkin, a Communist party lawmaker in the Samara regional parliament, seemed to bring to life the Russian idiom “to hang noodles on one’s ears,” which indicates deceiving or feeding false information to a listener.

Abdalkin said on social media that the Novokuybyshev city court would hear his case on March 7. His party had already previously reprimanded him.

Since invading Ukraine, Russia has intensified a clampdown on public dissent, establishing fines and potentially giving prison sentences for discrediting the armed forces by expressing negative opinions.

Ukraine has ordered the mandatory evacuation of vulnerable residents from the front-line city of Kupiansk and adjacent northeastern territories amid fears that Russia will retake the key city and rail hub.

“Mandatory evacuation of families with children and residents with limited mobility began in Kupiansk community … due to constant shelling of the territory of the community by Russian troops,” the Kharkiv region military administration said.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov have met briefly at a meeting of top diplomats from the Group of 20 (G20) nations in the first high-level meeting in months between the two countries.

US officials said Blinken and Lavrov chatted for roughly 10 minutes on the sidelines of the G20 conference in New Delhi.

The short encounter comes as relations between Washington and Moscow have plummeted while tensions over Russia’s war with Ukraine have soared.

Ukraine sees no need to limit wheat exports for the July 2023-June 2024 season because the winter harvest looks to be larger than expected, albeit smaller than in peacetime, a top agriculture ministry official says.

Ukraine was the world’s fifth largest wheat exporter before the war with Russia began last year, and its shipments were especially important to poor countries in Africa and the Middle East.

Based on results collected by the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food as well as satellite images, farmers planted more wheat in southern Ukraine than the ministry had forecast in autumn, first deputy farm minister Taras Vysotskiy told the Reuters news agency.

“The [supply] balance is positive, and so far, there are no reasons for it,” he said of government-imposed limits to wheat exports that would preserve more wheat for domestic consumption.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he discussed the evasion of Western sanctions against Russia in talks with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in Berlin.

“Naturally, we talked about this question,” Scholz told reporters, adding that Germany was monitoring the situation.

A new team of monitors from the UN nuclear watchdog arrived at Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia atomic power station, a Russian official told TASS news agency.

“Seven people arrived – three IAEA specialists and four employees of the UN Security Department,” Renat Karchaa, adviser to the general director of the Russian nuclear agency Rosenergoatom, told the state-run TASS.

Russia had previously accused the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of disrupting the latest monthly rotation of staff at the plant, which it said had been scheduled for February 7.

IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi has been pressing both sides to establish a demilitarised “safe zone” around the plant in fear of a nuclear accident.

The Parliament of Moldova has adopted a declaration condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

A narrow majority of 55 lawmakers in the 101-seat assembly voted for the declaration, which states that Moscow’s invasion began with the seizure of the Crimean Peninsula in February 2014 and demands the withdrawal of all Russian troops from Ukraine.

The declaration says Russia is waging an illegal, unprovoked and unfounded war of aggression in Ukraine and calls for an international tribunal to prosecute war crimes.

In recent weeks, tensions between Russia and Moldova, which borders Ukraine, have grown sharply after a Russian missile entered Moldovan airspace and Chisinau accused Moscow of plotting to topple the government.

Tatiana Kukhareva, a journalist in Moscow, told Al Jazeera that the alleged Bryansk attack has left two dead and raised alerts across other border villages.

“The death toll has just risen to two. Another local citizen has died, according to local authorities, from this attack, and an 11-year-old boy has been injured,” she said.

Al Jazeera could not confirm the toll.

“Other border regions have already voiced concerns. One governor has said that [security] on the border will be put on higher alert [with] similar statements from Sevastopol.”

Kukhareva said that in terms of its significance, while the defence ministry takes any attack seriously, Russian President Vladimir Putin had not called an emergency Security Council meeting.

“I have to say that border regions have been bearing the brunt of this conflict. Several villages in the neighbouring regions have also sustained, according to local authorities, shelling.”

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said he raised the case of Paul Whelan, a former US Marine detained in Russia, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, revealing that Washington has put forward a “serious proposal” to secure his release without providing details.

Late last year, Moscow freed US basketball player Brittney Griner in a prisoner exchange for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. The deal did not include Whelan.

“I also raised the wrongful detention of Paul Whelan, as I have on many previous occasions,” Blinken said.

“The United States has put forward a serious proposal. Moscow should accept it. We’re determined to bring Paul and every other American citizen who’s unjustly detained around the world home.”

Blinken has said that he implored Lavrov to end the conflict in Ukraine during their brief meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in India.

“I told the foreign minister what I and so many others said last week at the United Nations and what so many G20 foreign ministers said today: End this war of aggression, engage in meaningful diplomacy that can produce a just and durable peace,” Blinken said.

He added that Washington “stands ready to support Ukraine through diplomacy to end the war”, but Putin “has demonstrated zero interest in engaging”.

Blinken has said that he urged his Russian counterpart Lavrov to reverse Moscow’s “irresponsible decision” to freeze its participation in the New START treaty, which places limits on the US and Russian nuclear arsenals.

“Mutual compliance is in the interest of both our countries. It’s also what people around the world expect from us as nuclear powers,” Blinken said.

“I told the foreign minister [Lavrov] that no matter what else is happening in the world or in our relationship, the United States will always be ready to engage and act on strategic arms control, just as the United States and the Soviet Union did even at the height of the Cold War.”

Blinken has accused Putin of weaponising global food supplies and called on Russia to extend “without delay” an initiative set to expire this month that allows the export of grain from Ukraine.

“The unprecedented levels of food insecurity have been driven primarily by climate [change], by COVID and by conflicts, but the crisis has been worsened intentionally by President Putin, who’s weaponised the hunger of people across the globe,” Blinken said.

Foreign minister Qin Gang said that China will maintain communication and coordination with Russia at all levels at the G20 meeting in New Delhi.

On the Ukraine crisis, Qin told his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov that China supports all efforts to promote peace talks and is willing to play a constructive role in this regard, according to a statement by the Chinese foreign ministry.