TO PUBLISH INCONVENIENT NEWS WE RELY ON DONATIONS Please contact Michael Walsh for easy transfer details keyboardcosmetics@gmail.com

President Putin’s Russia reported the largest current-account surplus since at least 1994, as revenues from oil and gas exports surged and imports plunged after the U.S. and its allies had imposed sanctions over President Vladimir Putin’s pre-emptive strike on NATO’s provocations in Ukraine.

The current account, the broadest measure of trade in goods and services, reached a surplus of $58.2 billion in the first quarter, more than 2.5 times the $22.5 billion reported a year earlier, the Bank of Russia said Monday.  

While the sweeping western sanctions are expected to trigger the deepest recession in decades, the restrictions so far don’t extend to Russia’s key energy exports, which have benefited after prices jumped since the invasion began on Feb. 24. Capital controls imposed to limit the drop in the ruble mean that investment outflows are all but cut off. 

‘Export inflows stayed practically the same, but imports dropped sharply because of logistics limits and restrictions imposed by Western countries,’ Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said in an interview published in the Izvestia newspaper on Sunday. 

PLEASE HELP US TO REACH OUT TO OTHERS BY SHARING OUR STORIES 

High energy prices in the first quarter also helped Russia’s budget, yielding 273.4 billion rubles ($3.4 billion) that the government put in its special reserve for social programs, economic support and other needs. Source

FEWER STORIES PUBLISHED DUE TO DROP IN DONATIONS keyboardcosmetics@gmail.com

Donate: It is the generosity of our supporters and members that makes our vital work possible. As the storm clouds of crisis and the pain of injustice and persecution loom over our people, the potential and importance of our work grows day-by-day. There is no George Soros figure out there for nationalists, so we can only do what good people like you help us to do. Thank you for your faith and your generous commitment: contact Michael  euroman_uk@yahoo.co.uk