European Union Leaders Agree to Embargo Russian Oil Imports by Sea by Year-end

Manas Dasgupta

NEW DELHI, May 31: With no visible sign to end the Russia – Ukraine war, which has been raging for nearly 100 days, the European Union leaders agreed to embargo most Russian oil imports into the bloc by year-end as part of new sanctions on Moscow worked out at a summit focused on helping Ukraine with a long-delayed package of new financial support.

The embargo covers Russian oil brought in by sea, allowing a temporary exemption for imports delivered by pipeline, a move that was crucial to bring landlocked Hungary on board a decision that required consensus.

The sanctions came at a time when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian forces shelled the north-eastern city of Kharkiv again on Monday, as well as the border region of Sumy, which was hit from inside Russia. Russian shelling has reduced much of Sievierodonetsk to ruins, but the Ukrainian defence has slowed the wider Russian campaign across the Donbas region. Luhansk governor Sergiy Gaidai said Russian troops had advanced into Sievierodonetsk’s south-eastern and north-eastern fringes taking control of over half the city but Ukrainian forces had driven them from the village of Toshkivka to the south, which could frustrate a push to encircle the area. With temperatures rising, there was a “terrible smell of death” on the outskirts of Sievierodonetsk, Gaidai said.

Russian and Ukrainian troops traded blows in fierce close-quarter combat in an eastern Ukrainian city as Moscow’s soldiers, supported by intense shelling, attempted to gain a strategic foothold to conquer the region. Ukraine’s leader also made a rare frontline visit to Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city, to assess the strength of the national defence.

Meanwhile, the US President Joe Biden has turned down a request to send long-range rocket system to Ukraine. Biden told reporters outside the White House on Tuesday that “we are not going to send to Ukraine rocket systems that can strike into Russia.”

Ukraine said Russian forces have taken partial control of the east Ukraine city of Severodonetsk as Moscow’s army pushed deeper into the Donbas region. “The situation is extremely complicated. Part of Severodonetsk is controlled by the Russians,” Lugansk regional governor Sergiy Gaidai said in a statement on social media, adding that despite the Russian advance, Ukrainian forces “still remain in the city.”

Ukraine has identified more than 600 Russian war crime suspects and has started prosecuting around 80 of them, Kyiv’s top prosecutor said on Tuesday. The list of suspects includes “top military, politicians and propaganda agents of Russia”, prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova told a news conference in The Hague. Venediktova said Estonia, Latvia and Slovakia had decided to join an international investigation team in Ukraine.

Russia‘s Gazprom said it had halted gas supplies to the Netherlands after Dutch energy firm GasTerra refused to pay in rubles following the Russian military offensive in Ukraine. “Gazprom has completely stopped gas supplies to GasTerra due to non-payment in rubles,” the Russian gas giant said in a statement.

Moscow has demanded that clients from “unfriendly countries” — including EU member states — pay for its gas in rubles, a way to sidestep Western financial sanctions against its central bank over the Ukraine conflict.

British military intelligence said Russia was advancing slowly into Ukraine’s Luhansk Oblast, adding that the massing of its forces in a small area raised risks for others elsewhere. “Progress has been slow but gains are being held. Routes into the pocket likely remain under Ukrainian control,” Britain’s Ministry of Defence said in a Twitter update. “Russia has achieved greater local successes than earlier in the campaign by massing forces and fires in a relatively small area. This forces Russia to accept risk elsewhere in occupied territory,” it said.

Meanwhile, the first ship since Russia took control of the strategic sea port, left the Ukrainian port of Mariupol and is headed east to Russia, media report quoting the Russian-backed separatist leader of the Ukrainian breakaway region of Donetsk said on Tuesday.

A spokesperson for the port said last week that the ship would be loading 2,700 tonnes of metal in Mariupol before travelling east to the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don. Ukraine said the shipment of metal to Russia from Mariupol amounted to looting.

Three months after Russia started the invasion of Ukraine, its troops are making slow but steady advances in the eastern Donbas region. Russia has faced stiff resistance from the Ukrainian troops from day one and the crisis has snowballed into a larger security contest between Moscow and the West, which has pumped money and weapons to Ukraine. Experts believe that with no peace talks on the table and neither side showing any signs of compromise, the war is likely to grind on for many more weeks, if not

When Ukraine’s unusual path through World Cup qualifying resumes this week, it serves as a rejection of the idea that sports and politics must not mix. While Russia was thrown out of qualifying over its war in Ukraine, the Ukrainian national team was given several months extra to prepare for the European playoff matches.

Now if Ukraine wins two games this week, a team made up of players who mostly have not played a competitive game for six months because of the war at home will be at the World Cup in Qatar in November. Ukraine’s players and coach Oleksandr Petrakov have the blessing of President Zelensky to leave their homeland for the game at Scotland on June 1, when they will represent Ukraine’s yellow-and-blue colours and anthem in a vivid display of national identity on an international stage.

Meanwhile, France called for an investigation after a French journalist was killed in Ukraine when the vehicle he was travelling in, which was being used to evacuate civilians near the city of Sievierodonetsk, was hit by shelling. Frederic Leclerc-Imhoff, 32, the latest journalist killed since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, was on his second reporting trip for French television channel in Ukraine, his employer said.