Russia
New sanctions: How effective are they in stopping Russia's invasion of Ukraine?
The U.S. and other Group of Seven nations rolled out a new wave of global sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine as they met Friday during a summit in Japan. The sanctions target hundreds of people and firms — including those helping Russia to evade existing sanctions and export controls. Some of the sanctions focus on additional sectors of Russia's economy, including architecture, construction and transportation.
After 15 months of war, the allied nations are still aiming at new targets for financial penalties that block, freeze and seize access to international funds.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the newest sanctions will tighten the grip on Russian President Vladimir Putin's "ability to wage his barbaric invasion and will advance our global efforts to cut off Russian attempts to evade sanctions."
Also Read: Ukraine’s Zelenskyy at center of last day of high-level diplomacy as G7 looks to punish Russia
But there are limits to how much impact they can have.
A look at the sanctions dynamics:
WHAT'S IN THE NEWEST ROUND?
The U.K imposed sanctions on 86 people and companies, including parties connected to the theft and resale of Ukrainian grain. It also banned the import of diamonds from Russia. The European Union, too, plans to restrict trade in Russian diamonds.
The U.S. hit individuals and organizations across 20 countries, focusing on people and firms helping the Kremlin evade existing sanctions to procure technology. The Commerce Department added 71 firms to its list, and the State Department put 200 people, firms and vessels on its blocked list.
Also Read: Ukrainian president meets with world leaders at G7 as Russia claims a key victory in the war
Additionally, new U.S. reporting requirements were issued for people and firms that have any interest in Russian Central Bank assets. The purpose is to "fully map holdings of Russia's sovereign assets that will remain immobilized in G7 jurisdictions until Russia pays for the damage it has caused to Ukraine," the Treasury Department said.
HOW EFFECTIVE HAVE THE SANCTIONS BEEN SO FAR?
While the U.S. and other G7 nations have turned Russia into the most sanctioned country in the world, some foreign policy experts question the effectiveness of the financial penalties and point to Russia's maneuvers to evade them and press its war effort.
Maria Snegovaya, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Russia has demonstrated "a remarkable degree of adaptability to Western sanctions."
She added that the war is "relatively cheap" for Russia to prosecute, amounting to up to an estimated 5% of GDP.
Also Read: Ukraine says troops still engaging Russian forces in Bakhmut after Moscow announces victory in city
"That is easily manageable for Russia in the next couple of years at least, and the cumulative effect of sanctions is just not strong enough to radically alter that," she said.
U.S. officials defend the effectiveness of the sanctions, and argue that they are not designed to work immediately.
Along with imposing individual sanctions, the U.S. and allies have frozen Russian Central Bank funds, restricted Russian banks' access to SWIFT — the dominant system for global financial transactions — and imposed a $60-per-barrel price cap on Russian oil and diesel.
The Treasury Department on Friday in a new progress report said the price cap has been successful in suppressing Russian oil revenues. It cited Russian Ministry of Finance data showing that the Kremlin's oil revenues from January to March of this year were more than 40% lower than in the same period last year.
"Despite widespread initial market skepticism around the price cap, market participants and geopolitical analysts have now acknowledged that the price cap is accomplishing both of its goals," the Treasury Department report.
WHY ARE THE US AND ITS ALLIES STILL FINDING NEW TARGETS?
Treasury officials say that as sanctions are imposed, Russian intelligence keeps looking for ways to get around them, requiring constant adjustments.
Newer sanction efforts have been dedicated to the evaders and the "facilitators" of evasion, who help Russia acquire supplies and technology.
"We know the Kremlin is actively seeking ways to circumvent these sanctions," Treasury Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo said earlier this year.
"One of the ways we know our sanctions are working is the Kremlin has tasked its intelligence services, such as the FSB and GRU, to find ways to get around them."
Among other things, U.S. officials say, Moscow has turned to North Korea and Iran to resupply the Russian military with drones and surface-to-surface missiles.
WHAT MORE IS THERE TO SANCTION?
Treasury officials say future targets could include newly identified firms and people connected to supply chains that help Russia gain materials for the war, front companies that help Russia evade sanctions and rogue actors from North Korea and Iran.
For the past month, Treasury officials Brian Nelson and Liz Rosenberg have traveled across Europe and Central Asia to press countries that do business with the Kremlin to cut off financial ties because of the war on Ukraine.
They are also increasingly sharing intelligence between countries and firms to spot evasion.
There are also calls for the U.S. and allies to confiscate and transfer Russia's central bank funds to Ukraine for the war effort.
"The G7 countries must sustain and augment their efforts, including by confiscating frozen reserves of the Central Bank of Russia to help fund Ukraine's reconstruction," said Jeffrey J. Schott, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
‘Exhaust them’: Why Ukraine has fought Russia for every inch of Bakhmut, despite high cost
The nine-month battle for Bakhmut has destroyed the 400-year-old city in eastern Ukraine and killed tens of thousands of people in a mutually devastating demonstration of Ukraine's strategy of exhausting the Russian military.
The fog of war made it impossible to confirm the situation on the ground Sunday in the invasion's longest battle: Russia's defense ministry reported that the Wagner private army backed by Russian troops had seized the city. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, meanwhile, said Bakhmut was not being fully occupied by Russian forces.
Regardless, the small city has long had more symbolic than strategic value for both sides. The more meaningful gauge of success for Ukrainian forces has been their ability to keep the Russians bogged down. The Ukrainian military has aimed to deplete the resources and morale of Russian troops in the tiny but tactical patch of the 1,500-kilometer (932-mile) front line as Ukraine gears up for a major counteroffensive in the 15-month-old war.
"Despite the fact that we now control a small part of Bakhmut, the importance of its defense does not lose its relevance," said Col.-Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, the Commander of Ground Forces for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. "This gives us the opportunity to enter the city in case of a change in the situation. And it will definitely happen."
Also Read: Ukraine says troops still engaging Russian forces in Bakhmut after Moscow announces victory in city
About 55 kilometers (34 miles) north of the Russian-held regional capital of Donetsk, Bakhmut was an important industrial center, surrounded by salt and gypsum mines and home to about 80,000 people before the war, in a country of more than 43 million.
The city, named Artyomovsk after a Bolshevik revolutionary when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, was known for its sparkling wine produced in underground caves. It was popular among tourists for its broad tree-lined avenues, lush parks and stately downtown with imposing late 19th century mansions. All are now reduced to a smoldering wasteland.
Fought over so fiercely by Russia and Ukraine in recent months has been the urban center itself, where Ukrainian commanders have conceded that Moscow controlled more than 90%. But even now, Ukrainian forces are making significant advances near strategic roads through the countryside just outside, chipping away at Russia's northern and southern flanks by the meter (yard) with the aim of encircling Wagner fighters inside the city.
Also Read: Ukraine’s Zelenskyy at center of last day of high-level diplomacy as G7 looks to punish Russia
"The enemy failed to surround Bakhmut. They lost part of the heights around the city. The continuing advance of our troops in the suburbs greatly complicates the enemy's presence," said Hanna Maliar, Ukraine's deputy defense minister. "Our troops have taken the city in a semi-encirclement, which gives us the opportunity to destroy the enemy."
Ukrainian military leaders say their months-long resistance has been worth it because it limited Russia's capabilities elsewhere and allowed for Ukrainian advances.
Also Read: Ukrainian president meets with world leaders at G7 as Russia claims a key victory in the war
"The main idea is to exhaust them, then to attack," Ukrainian Col. Yevhen Mezhevikin, commander of a specialized group fighting in Bakhmut, said Thursday.
Russia has deployed reinforcements to Bakhmut to replenish lost northern and southern flanks and prevent more Ukrainian breakthroughs, according to Ukrainian officials and other outside observers. Russian President Vladimir Putin badly needs to claim victory in Bakhmut city, where Russian forces have focused their efforts, analysts say, especially after a winter offensive by his forces failed to capture other cities and towns along the front.
Some analysts said that even Ukraine's tactical gains in the rural area outside urban Bakhmut could be more significant than they seem.
Also Read: Zelenskyy says ‘Bakhmut is only in our hearts’ after Russia claims controls of Ukrainian city
"It was almost like the Ukrainians just took advantage of the fact that, actually, the Russian lines were weak," said Phillips O'Brien, a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews. "The Russian army has suffered such high losses and is so worn out around Bakhmut that ... it cannot go forward anymore."
Ukrainian forces in the outskirts of Bakhmut and in the city bore relentless artillery attacks until a month ago. Then, Ukrainian forces positioned south of the city spotted their chance for a breakthrough after reconnaissance drones showed the southern Russian flank had gone on the defensive, Col. Mezhevikin said.
After fierce fighting for weeks, Ukrainian units had made their first advance in the vicinity of Bakhmut since it was invaded nine months ago.
In all, nearly 20 square kilometers (eight square miles) of territory were recaptured, Maliar said in an interview last week. Hundreds of meters (yards) more have been regained almost every day since, according to Serhii Cherevatyi, spokesman for Ukraine's Operational Command East.
"Previously we were only holding the lines and didn't let Russians advance further into our territory. What has happened now is our first advance (since the battle started)," Maliar said.
Victory in Bakhmut does not necessarily bring Russia any closer to capturing the Donetsk region — Putin's stated aim of the war. Rather, it opens the door to more grinding battles in the direction of Sloviansk or Kostiantynivka, 20 kilometers (12 miles) away, said Kateryna Stepanenko, a Russia analyst at the U.S.-based think tank Institute for the Study of War.
Satellite imagery released this week shows infrastructure, apartment blocks and iconic buildings reduced to rubble.
In the last week, days before Russia announced that the city had fallen into their control, Ukrainian forces retained only a handful of buildings amid constant Russian bombardment. Outnumbered and outgunned, they described nightmarish days.
Russia's artillery dominance is so overwhelming, accompanied by continuous human waves of mercenaries, that defensive positions could not be held for long.
"The importance of our mission of staying in Bakhmut lies in distracting a significant enemy force," said Taras Deiak, a commander of a special unit of a volunteer battalion. "We are paying a high price for this."
The northern and southern flanks regained by Ukraine are located near two highways that lead to Chasiv Yar, a town 10 kilometers (6 miles) from Bakhmut that serves as a key logistics supply route, one dubbed the "road of life."
Ukrainian forces passing this road often came under fire from Russians positioned along nearby strategic heights. Armored vehicles and pickup trucks driving toward the city to replenish Ukrainian troops were frequently destroyed.
With the high plains now under Ukrainian control, its forces have more breathing room.
"This will help us design new logistic chains to deliver ammunition in and evacuate the injured or killed boys," said Deiak, speaking from inside the city on Thursday, two days before Russia claimed it controlled the city. "Now it is easier to deliver supplies, rotate troops, (carry out) evacuations."
Ukraine says troops still engaging Russian forces in Bakhmut after Moscow announces victory in city
Ukrainian soldiers were still engaging Russian forces in fierce battles in and around Bakhmut on Sunday, military officials said, hours after Moscow and the private army Wagner announced that their troops had taken full control of the eastern city.
The fog of war made it impossible to confirm the situation on the ground in the invasion's longest battle, and a series of comments from Ukrainian and Russian officials added confusion to the matter.
Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar even went so far as to say that Ukrainian troops "took the city in a semi-encirclement."
"The enemy failed to surround Bakhmut, and they lost part of the dominant heights around the city," Malyar said. "That is, the advance of our troops in the suburbs along the flanks, which is still ongoing, greatly complicates the enemy's presence in Bakhmut."
Also Read: Ukraine’s Zelenskyy at center of last day of high-level diplomacy as G7 looks to punish Russia
Her comments came after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, at the Group of Seven summit in Japan, appeared to suggest that Bakhmut had fallen.
When asked if the city was in Ukraine's hands, Zelenskyy said: "I think no, but you have to -- to understand that there is nothing, They've destroyed everything. There are no buildings. It's a pity. It's tragedy."
Zelenskyy's press secretary later walked back those comments.
Also Read: Ukrainian president meets with world leaders at G7 as Russia claims a key victory in the war
And the spokesman for Ukraine's Eastern Group of Forces, Serhii Cherevaty, said that the Ukrainian military is managing to hold positions in the vicinity of Bakhmut.
"The president correctly said that the city has, in fact, been razed to the ground. The enemy is being destroyed every day by massive artillery and aviation strikes, and our units report that the situation is extremely difficult.
"Our military keep fortifications and several premises in the southwestern part of the city. Heavy fighting is underway," he said.
It was only the latest flip-flopping of the situation in Bakhmut after eight months of intense fighting.
Also Read: Zelenskyy says ‘Bakhmut is only in our hearts’ after Russia claims controls of Ukrainian city
Only hours earlier, Russian state new agencies reported that President Vladimir Putin congratulated "Wagner assault detachments, as well as all servicemen of the Russian Armed Forces units, who provided them with the necessary support and flank protection, on the completion of the operation to liberate Artyomovsk," which is Bakhmut's Soviet-era name.
Russia's Defense Ministry also said that Wagner and military units "completed the liberation" of Bakhmut.
At the G-7 in Japan, Zelenskyy stood side by side with U.S. President Joe Biden during a news conference. Biden announced $375 million more in aid for Ukraine, which included more ammunition, artillery and vehicles.
"I thanked him for the significant financial assistance to (Ukraine) from (the U.S.)," Zelenskyy tweeted later.
The new pledge came after the U.S. agreed to allow training on American-made F-16 fighter jets, laying the groundwork for their eventual transfer to Ukraine. Biden said Sunday that Zelenskyy had given the U.S. a "flat assurance" that Ukraine wouldn't use the F-16s jets to attack Russian territory.
Many analysts say that even if Russia was victorious in Bakhmut, it was unlikely to turn the tide in the war.
The Russian capture of the last remaining ground in Bakhmut is "not tactically or operationally significant," a Washington-based think tank said late Saturday. The Institute for the Study of War said that taking control of these areas "does not grant Russian forces operationally significant terrain to continue conducting offensive operations," nor to "to defend against possible Ukrainian counterattacks."
In a video posted on Telegram, Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin said the city came under complete Russian control at about midday Saturday. He spoke surrounded by about a half-dozen fighters, with ruined buildings in the background and explosions heard in the distance.
Russian forces still seek to seize the remaining part of the Donetsk region still under Ukrainian control, including several heavily fortified areas.
It isn't clear which side has paid a higher price in the battle for Bakhmut. Both Russia and Ukraine have endured losses believed to be in the thousands, though neither has disclosed casualty numbers.
Zelenskyy underlined the importance of defending Bakhmut in an interview with The Associated Press in March, saying its fall could allow Russia to rally international support for a deal that might require Kyiv to make unacceptable compromises.
Analysts have said Bakhmut's fall would be a blow to Ukraine and give some tactical advantages to Russia but wouldn't prove decisive to the outcome of the war.
Bakhmut, located about 55 kilometers (34 miles) north of the Russian-held regional capital of Donetsk, had a prewar population of 80,000 and was an important industrial center, surrounded by salt and gypsum mines.
The city, which was named Artyomovsk after a Bolshevik revolutionary when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, also was known for its sparkling wine production in underground caves. Its broad tree-lined avenues, lush parks and stately downtown with imposing late 19th-century mansions — all now reduced to a smoldering wasteland — made it a popular tourist destination.
When a separatist rebellion engulfed eastern Ukraine in 2014 weeks after Moscow's illegal annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula, the rebels quickly won control of the city, only to lose it a few months later.
After Russia switched its focus to the Donbas following a botched attempt to seize Kyiv early in the February 2022 invasion, Moscow's troops tried to take Bakhmut in August but were pushed back.
The fighting there abated in autumn as Russia was confronted with Ukrainian counteroffensives in the east and the south, but it resumed at full pace late last year. In January, Russia captured the salt-mining town of Soledar, just north of Bakhmut, and closed in on the city's suburbs.
Intense Russian shelling targeted the city and nearby villages as Moscow waged a three-sided assault to try to finish off the resistance in what Ukrainians called "fortress Bakhmut."
Mercenaries from Wagner spearheaded the Russian offensive. Prigozhin tried to use the battle for the city to expand his clout amid the tensions with the top Russian military leaders whom he harshly criticized.
"We fought not only with the Ukrainian armed forces in Bakhmut. We fought the Russian bureaucracy, which threw sand in the wheels," Prigozhin said in the video on Saturday.
The relentless Russian artillery bombardment left few buildings intact amid ferocious house-to-house battles. Wagner fighters "marched on the bodies of their own soldiers" according to Ukrainian officials. Both sides have spent ammunition at a rate unseen in any armed conflict for decades, firing thousands of rounds a day.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has said that seizing the city would allow Russia to press its offensive farther into the Donetsk region, one of the four Ukrainian provinces that Moscow illegally annexed in September.
Ukraine’s Zelenskyy at center of last day of high-level diplomacy as G7 looks to punish Russia
World leaders ratcheted up pressure Sunday on Russia for its war against Ukraine, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the center of a swirl of diplomacy on the final day of the Group of Seven summit of rich-world democracies.
Zelenskyy's in-person attendance at one of the world's premier diplomatic gatherings is meant to galvanize attention on his nation's 15-month fight against Russia. Even before he landed Saturday on a French plane, the G7 nations had unveiled a slew of new sanctions and other measures meant to punish Moscow and hamper its war-fighting abilities.
Ukraine is the overwhelming focus of the summit, but the leaders of Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada and Italy, as well as the European Union, are also working to address global worries over climate change, AI, poverty, economic instability and nuclear proliferation.
Also Read: Ukrainian president meets with world leaders at G7 as Russia claims a key victory in the war
Two U.S. allies — South Korea and Japan — continued efforts Sunday to improve ties that have often been hurt by lingering anger over issues linked to Japan's brutal 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean Peninsula. Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol visited a memorial to Korean victims, many of them slave laborers, of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing.
Washington wants the two neighbors, both of which are liberal democracies and bulwarks of U.S. power in the region, to stand together on a host of issues, including rising aggression from China, North Korea and Russia.
Bolstering international support is a key priority as Ukraine prepares for what's seen as a major push to take back territory seized by Russia in the war that began in February last year. Zelenskyy's visit to the G7 summit closely followed the United States agreeing to allow training on potent American-made fighter jets, which lays the groundwork for their eventual transfer to Ukraine.
Also Read: Zelenskyy says ‘Bakhmut is only in our hearts’ after Russia claims controls of Ukrainian city
"Japan. G7. Important meetings with partners and friends of Ukraine. Security and enhanced cooperation for our victory. Peace will become closer today," Zelenskyy tweeted after his arrival.
U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan said that President Joe Biden and Zelenskyy would have direct engagement at the summit. On Friday, Biden announced his support for training Ukrainian pilots on U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets, a precursor to eventually providing those aircraft to Ukraine.
"It is necessary to improve (Ukraine's) air defense capabilities, including the training of our pilots," Zelenskyy wrote on his official Telegram channel after meeting Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, one of a number of leaders he talked to.
Zelenskyy also met on the sidelines of the summit with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, their first face-to-face talks since the war, and briefed him on Ukraine's peace plan, which calls for the withdrawal of Russian troops from the country before any negotiations.
India, the world's largest democracy, has avoided outright condemnation of Russia's invasion. While India maintains close ties with the United States and its Western allies, it is also a major buyer of Russian arms and oil.
Summits like the G7 are a chance for leaders to put pressure on one another to align or redouble their diplomatic efforts, according to Matthew Goodman, an economics expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington. "Zelenskyy's presence puts some pressure on G7 leaders to deliver more — or explain to him directly why they can't," he said.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov criticized the G7 summit for aiming to isolate both China and Russia.
"The task has been set loudly and openly: to defeat Russia on the battlefield, but not to stop there, but to eliminate it as a geopolitical competitor. As a matter of fact, any other country that claims some kind of independent place in the world alignment will also be to suppress a competitor. Look at the decisions that are now being discussed and adopted in Hiroshima, at the G7 summit, and which are aimed at the double containment of Russia and China," he said.
The G7, however, has vowed to intensify the pressure.
"Russia's brutal war of aggression represents a threat to the whole world in breach of fundamental norms, rules and principles of the international community. We reaffirm our unwavering support for Ukraine for as long as it takes to bring a comprehensive, just and lasting peace," the group said in a statement.
Another major focus of the meetings was China, the world's No. 2 economy.
There is increasing anxiety that Beijing, which has been steadily building up its nuclear weapons program, could try to seize Taiwan by force, sparking a wider conflict. China claims the self-governing island as its own and regularly sends ships and warplanes near it.
The G7 said they did not want to harm China and were seeking "constructive and stable relations" with Beijing, "recognizing the importance of engaging candidly with and expressing our concerns directly to China."
They also urged China to pressure Russia to end the war in Ukraine and "support a comprehensive, just and lasting peace."
China's Foreign Ministry said that "gone are the days when a handful of Western countries can just willfully meddle in other countries' internal affairs and manipulate global affairs. We urge G7 members to ... focus on addressing the various issues they have at home, stop ganging up to form exclusive blocs, stop containing and bludgeoning other countries."
The G7 also warned North Korea, which has been testing missiles at a torrid pace, to completely abandon its nuclear bomb ambitions, "including any further nuclear tests or launches that use ballistic missile technology," the leaders' statement said.
The green light on F-16 training is the latest shift by the Biden administration as it moves to arm Ukraine with more advanced and lethal weaponry, following earlier decisions to send rocket launcher systems and Abrams tanks. The United States has insisted that it is sending weapons to Ukraine to defend itself and has discouraged attacks by Ukraine into Russian territory.
"We've reached a moment where it is time to look down the road again to say what is Ukraine going to need as part of a future force, to be able to deter and defend against Russian aggression as we go forward," Sullivan said.
Biden's decisions on when, how many, and who will provide the fourth-generation F-16 fighter jets will be made in the months ahead while the training is underway, Biden told leaders.
The G7 leaders have rolled out a new wave of global sanctions on Moscow as well as plans to enhance the effectiveness of existing financial penalties meant to constrain President Vladimir Putin's war effort. Russia is now the most-sanctioned country in the world, but there are questions about the effectiveness.
Russia had participated in some summits with the other seven countries before being removed from the then-Group of Eight after its 2014 annexation of Crimea.
The latest sanctions aimed at Russia include tighter restrictions on already-sanctioned people and firms involved in the war effort. More than 125 individuals and organizations across 20 countries have been hit with U.S. sanctions.
Kishida has twice taken leaders to visit to a peace park dedicated to the tens of thousands who died in the world's first wartime atomic bomb detonation. Kishida, who represents Hiroshima in parliament, wants nuclear disarmament to be a major focus of discussions.
The G7 leaders also discussed efforts to strengthen the global economy and address rising prices that are squeezing families and government budgets around the world, particularly in developing countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
The group reiterated its aim to pull together up to $600 billion in financing for the G7's global infrastructure development initiative, which is meant to offer countries an alternative to China's investment dollars.
Ukrainian president meets with world leaders at G7 as Russia claims a key victory in the war
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy huddled with some of his biggest backers in Hiroshima on Sunday, building momentum for his country's war effort even as Russia claimed a symbolic victory on the battlefield.
The Ukrainian leader's in-person appearance in his trademark olive drab during the final day of the Group of Seven summit underscored the centrality of the war for the bloc of rich democracies. It also stole much of the limelight from other priorities, including security challenges in Asia and outreach to the developing world, that the leaders focused on at the three-day gathering.
Zelenskyy held two major rounds of meetings Sunday, one with G7 leaders and a second with them and a host of invited guests including India, South Korea and Brazil. He also held one-on-one talks with several of the leaders.
Also Read: Zelenskyy says ‘Bakhmut is only in our hearts’ after Russia claims controls of Ukrainian city
U.S. President Joe Biden announced a new military aid package worth $375 million for Ukraine during his meeting with Zelenskyy, saying the U.S. would provide ammunition and armored vehicles. That fresh pledge came days after the U.S. agreed to allow training on American-made F-16 fighter jets, laying the groundwork for their eventual transfer to Ukraine.
"We have Ukraine's back and we're not going anywhere," Biden said.
Zelenskyy thanked Biden for the support, adding that "we will never forget."
Even before Zelenskyy landed Saturday aboard a French plane, the G7 nations had unveiled a slew of new sanctions and other measures meant to punish Moscow over its invasion that began in February last year.
Read More: G7 'outreach' an effort to build consensus on global issues like Ukraine, China, climate change
Hanging over Sunday's talks was the claim by Russia's Defense Ministry that forces of the Wagner private army, backed by Russian troops, had seized the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. The eight-month battle for the eastern city — seen by both sides as a major symbolic prize — has been the longest and likely the bloodiest of the war.
Asked if Bakhmut was still in Ukraine's hands, Zelenskyy said he thought that Russian forces had finally taken the city in a siege that "destroyed everything."
"For today, Bakhmut is only in our hearts. There is nothing in this place," Zelenskyy said, adding that the fight had left nothing in Bakhmut but a lot of "dead Russians."
While Ukraine was the overwhelming focus of the summit, the leaders of Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada and Italy, as well as the European Union, also aimed to address global worries over climate change, AI, poverty, economic instability and nuclear proliferation.
Biden also aimed to reassure world leaders that the U.S. would not default because of the debt limit standoff that has cast a large shadow over his trip.
Two U.S. allies — South Korea and Japan — continued efforts Sunday to improve ties that have often been hurt by lingering anger over issues linked to Japan's brutal 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean Peninsula. Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol visited a memorial to Korean victims, many of them slave laborers, of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing.
Washington wants the two neighbors, both of which are liberal democracies and bulwarks of U.S. power in the region, to stand together on issues, including rising aggression from China, North Korea and Russia.
Biden, Yoon and Kishida met briefly as a group outside the summit venue posing for photos in front of Hiroshima Bay. Biden invited the two leaders to visit Washington for a trilateral meeting and they accepted, a US official who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity said.
Zelenskyy also met on the sidelines of the summit with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, their first face-to-face talks since the war, and briefed him on Ukraine's peace plan, which calls for the withdrawal of Russian troops from the country before any negotiations.
India, the world's largest democracy, has avoided outright condemnation of Russia's invasion. While India maintains close ties with the U.S. and its Western allies, it is also a major buyer of Russian arms and oil.
Summits like the G7 are a chance for leaders to put pressure on one another to align or redouble their diplomatic efforts, according to Matthew Goodman, an economics expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington.
"Zelenskyy's presence puts some pressure on G7 leaders to deliver more — or explain to him directly why they can't," he said.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov criticized the summit for aiming to isolate both China and Russia.
"The task has been set loudly and openly: to defeat Russia on the battlefield, but not to stop there, but to eliminate it as a geopolitical competitor," he said.
The G7, however, has vowed to intensify the pressure, calling Russia's assault on Ukraine "a threat to the whole world in breach of fundamental norms, rules and principles of the international community."
The group took a different approach in its comments on China, the world's No. 2 economy. There is increasing anxiety that Beijing, which has been steadily building up its nuclear weapons program, could try to seize self-governing Taiwan by force, sparking a wider conflict.
The G7 said they did not want to harm China and was seeking "constructive and stable relations" with Beijing, "recognizing the importance of engaging candidly with and expressing our concerns directly to China."
They also urged China to pressure Russia to end the war in Ukraine and "support a comprehensive, just and lasting peace."
China's Foreign Ministry said that "gone are the days when a handful of Western countries can just willfully meddle in other countries' internal affairs and manipulate global affairs. We urge G7 members to ... focus on addressing the various issues they have at home, stop ganging up to form exclusive blocs, stop containing and bludgeoning other countries."
The G7 also warned North Korea, which has been testing missiles at a torrid pace, to completely abandon its nuclear weapon ambitions, "including any further nuclear tests or launches that use ballistic missile technology," the leaders' statement said.
The G7 leaders have rolled out a new wave of global sanctions on Russia, now the most-sanctioned country in the world, as well as plans to enhance the effectiveness of existing financial penalties meant to constrain President Vladimir Putin's war effort.
The latest sanctions aimed at Russia include tighter restrictions on already-sanctioned people and firms involved in the war effort. More than 125 individuals and organizations across 20 countries have been hit with U.S. sanctions.
Russia had participated in some summits with the other seven countries before being removed from the then-Group of Eight after its 2014 annexation of Crimea.
Kishida, mindful of the host city's symbolic importance, has twice taken leaders to visit to a peace park dedicated to the tens of thousands who died in the world's first wartime atomic bomb detonation. He had wanted nuclear disarmament to be a major focus of discussions.
Some survivors of the 1945 atomic bomb attack and their families worried that Zelenskyy's inclusion at the summit overshadowed that priority. Etsuko Nakatani, an activist whose parents survived the Hiroshima atomic bombing, said the leader's visit was "not appropriate for Hiroshima, which is a peace-loving city."
Protesters carrying "No War No G7" banners briefly scuffled with riot police deployed as part of a massive show of force throughout the city during a march Sunday.
The G7 leaders also discussed efforts to strengthen the global economy and address rising prices that are squeezing families and government budgets around the world, particularly in developing countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. They reiterated their aim to pull together up to $600 billion in financing for the G7's global infrastructure development initiative, which is meant to offer countries an alternative to China's investment dollars.
Zelenskyy says ‘Bakhmut is only in our hearts’ after Russia claims controls of Ukrainian city
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Sunday that Bakhmut was "only in our hearts," hours after Russia's defense ministry reported that forces of the Wagner private army, with the support of Russian troops, had seized the city in eastern Ukraine.
Speaking alongside U.S. President Joe Biden at the Group of Seven summit in Hiroshima, Japan, Zelenskyy said the Russians had destroyed "everything." "You have to understand that there is nothing," he said.
"For today, Bakhmut is only in our hearts," he said. "There is nothing in this place."
The Russian ministry statement on the Telegram channel came about eight hours after a similar announcement by Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin. Ukrainian authorities at that time said that fighting for Bakhmut was continuing.
The eight-month battle for Bakhmut has been the longest and probably most bloody of the conflict in Ukraine.
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Zelenskyy's comments came as Biden announced $375 million more in aid for Ukraine, which included more ammunition, artillery, and vehicles.
"I thanked him for the significant financial assistance to (Ukraine) from (the U.S.)," Zelenskyy tweeted later.
Analysts said that a Russian victory in Bakhmut was unlikely to turn the tide in the war.
The Russian capture of the last remaining ground in Bakhmut is "not tactically or operationally significant," a Washington-based think tank said late Saturday. The Institute for the Study of War said that taking control of these areas "does not grant Russian forces operationally significant terrain to continue conducting offensive operations," nor to "to defend against possible Ukrainian counterattacks."
Using the city's Soviet-era name, the Russian ministry said, "In the Artyomovsk tactical direction, the assault teams of the Wagner private military company with the support of artillery and aviation of the southern battlegroup has completed the liberation of the city of Artyomovsk."
Russian state news agencies cited the Kremlin's press service as saying President Vladimir Putin "congratulates the Wagner assault detachments, as well as all servicemen of the Russian Armed Forces units, who provided them with the necessary support and flank protection, on the completion of the operation to liberate Artyomovsk."
In a video posted earlier on Telegram, Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin said the city came under complete Russian control at about midday Saturday. He spoke flanked by about a half dozen fighters, with ruined buildings in the background and explosions heard in the distance.
Fighting has raged in and around Bakhmut for more than eight months.
Russian forces will still face the massive task of seizing the remaining part of the Donetsk region still under Ukrainian control, including several heavily fortified areas.
It isn't clear which side has paid a higher price in the battle for Bakhmut. Both Russia and Ukraine have endured losses believed to be in the thousands, though neither has disclosed casualty numbers.
Zelenskyy underlined the importance of defending Bakhmut in an interview with The Associated Press in March, saying its fall could allow Russia to rally international support for a deal that might require Kyiv to make unacceptable compromises.
Analysts have said Bakhmut's fall would be a blow to Ukraine and give some tactical advantages to Russia but wouldn't prove decisive to the outcome of the war.
Russian forces still face the enormous task of seizing the rest of the Donetsk region under Ukrainian control, including several heavily fortified areas. The provinces of Donetsk and neighboring Luhansk make up the Donbas, Ukraine's industrial heartland where a separatist uprising began in 2014 and which Moscow illegally annexed in September.
Bakhmut, located about 55 kilometers (34 miles) north of the Russian-held regional capital of Donetsk, had a prewar population of 80,000 and was an important industrial center, surrounded by salt and gypsum mines.
The city, which was named Artyomovsk after a Bolshevik revolutionary when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, also was known for its sparkling wine production in underground caves. Its broad tree-lined avenues, lush parks and stately downtown with imposing late 19th-century mansions — all now reduced to a smoldering wasteland — made it a popular tourist destination.
When a separatist rebellion engulfed eastern Ukraine in 2014 weeks after Moscow's illegal annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula, the rebels quickly won control of the city, only to lose it a few months later.
After Russia switched its focus to the Donbas following a botched attempt to seize Kyiv early in the February 2022 invasion, Moscow's troops tried to take Bakhmut in August but were pushed back.
The fighting there abated in autumn as Russia was confronted with Ukrainian counteroffensives in the east and the south, but it resumed at full pace late last year. In January, Russia captured the salt-mining town of Soledar, just north of Bakhmut, and closed in on the city's suburbs.
Intense Russian shelling targeted the city and nearby villages as Moscow waged a three-sided assault to try to finish off the resistance in what Ukrainians called "fortress Bakhmut."
Mercenaries from Wagner spearheaded the Russian offensive. Prigozhin tried to use the battle for the city to expand his clout amid the tensions with the top Russian military leaders whom he harshly criticized.
"We fought not only with the Ukrainian armed forces in Bakhmut. We fought the Russian bureaucracy, which threw sand in the wheels," Prigozhin said in the video on Saturday.
The relentless Russian artillery bombardment left few buildings intact amid ferocious house-to-house battles. Wagner fighters "marched on the bodies of their own soldiers" according to Ukrainian officials. Both sides have spent ammunition at a rate unseen in any armed conflict for decades, firing thousands of rounds a day.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has said that seizing the city would allow Russia to press its offensive farther into the Donetsk region, one of the four Ukrainian provinces that Moscow illegally annexed in September.
European nations zoom in on establishing system to pinpoint how much damage Russia caused in Ukraine
Leaders from across Europe were wrapping a two-day summit on Wednesday, putting the final touches on a system to establish the damage Russia is causing during the war in Ukraine, in the hopes it can be forced to compensate victims and help rebuild the nation once the conflict is over.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine was the dominant topic during the meeting in the Icelandic capital, Reykjavík, where delegations from the Council of Europe discussed how the continent’s preeminent human rights organization can support Kyiv.
The most tangible outcome of the meeting — the first summit the Council of Europe has held in nearly two decades — is the creation of the register of damages. Expected to be housed in The Hague, the register will allow victims of the war to report the harm they have suffered.
Also Read: Russia's threat to exit Ukraine grain deal adds risk to global food security
“When we think in terms of reconstruction it’s an enormously important judicial element to have this register of damages to give justice to the victims,” said European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said, speaking at the opening of the summit late Tuesday.
The record is “intended to constitute the first component of a future international compensation mechanism” according to a Council of Europe document. The operation will be financed by the signatories.
Such a register could be used to distribute reparations from a proposed tribunal to prosecute the crime of aggression, another concept backed by the Council of Europe. In his address to the summit on Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reiterated his country’s wish for such a court.
Also Read: G-7 leaders likely to focus on the war in Ukraine and tensions in Asia at summit in Hiroshima
There will be no reliable peace without justice,” he said, speaking to the opening session via video link.
The Council of Europe's secretary general, Marija Pejčinović Burić, announced ahead of the summit that the body intends to support the international effort to establish a judicial organ to prosecute the crime of aggression — the literal act of invading another country.
The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin and another official for war crimes, accusing him of personal responsibility for the abductions of children from Ukraine. But the court lacks the ability to prosecute aggression.
Not all of the Council of Europe’s 46 members are backing the damages register, however. Ten countries, including Hungary, Turkey and Serbia have refused to sign up. Switzerland has also not joined, but this is a result of domestic legal requirements, according to Swiss officials, and the Alpine nation plans to become a signatory as soon as possible.
Russia's threat to exit Ukraine grain deal adds risk to global food security
The United Nations is racing to extend a deal that has allowed shipments of Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea to parts of the world struggling with hunger, helping ease a global food crisis exacerbated by the war Russia launched more than a year ago.
The breakthrough accord that the U.N. and Turkey brokered with the warring sides last summer came with a separate agreement to ease shipments of Russian food and fertilizer that Moscow insists hasn't been applied.
Russia set a Thursday deadline for its concerns to be ironed out or it's bowing out. Such brinkmanship isn't new: With a similar extension in the balance in March, Russia unilaterally decided to renew the deal for just 60 days instead of the 120 days outlined in the agreement.
U.N. officials and analysts warn that a failure to extend the Black Sea Grain Initiative could hurt countries in Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia that rely on Ukrainian wheat, barley, vegetable oil and other affordable food products, especially as drought takes a toll. The deal helped lower prices of food commodities like wheat over the last year, but that relief has not reached kitchen tables.
“If you have a cancellation of the grain deal again, when we’re already at a pretty tight situation, it’s just one more thing that the world doesn’t need, so the prices could start heading higher,” said William Osnato, a senior research analyst at agriculture data and analytics firm Gro Intelligence. “You don’t see relief on the horizon.”
U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths told the Security Council on Monday that the deal was “critical” and talks were ongoing.
Negotiators who gathered in Istanbul last week made little apparent headway. Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said the grain deal “should be extended for a longer period of time and expanded” to “give predictability and confidence" to markets.
Moscow says it opposes broadening or indefinitely expanding the deal. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that there's an “intense session of contacts” but that ”a decision is yet to be made.”
Russia, meanwhile, is rapidly shipping a bumper harvest of its wheat through other ports. Critics say that suggests Moscow is posturing or trying to wrest concessions in other areas — such as on Western sanctions — and claim it has dragging its heels on joint inspections of ships carried out by Russian, Ukrainian, U.N. and Turkish officials.
Average daily inspections — meant to ensure vessels carry only food and not weapons — have steadily dropped from a peak of 10.6 in October to 3.2 last month.
Russia denies slowing the work, with shipments of Ukrainian grain also declining in recent weeks.
“We cannot agree that the role of the Russian representative (inspector) should be reduced to automatic rubber-stamping, or approval, or appeals submitted by Kyiv,” Russia’s ambassador in Geneva, Gennady Gatilov, told reporters last month.
Asked whether a blockade of Ukraine's coast or more attacks on its ports could follow any withdrawal from the agreement, Gatilov said Russian authorities were “considering all possible scenarios if the deal is not extended.”
Russia has five main asks, according to Gatilov:
— A restoration of foreign supplies of farm machinery and replacement parts.
— A lifting of restrictions on insurance and access to foreign ports for Russian ships and cargo.
— Resumed operation of a pipeline that sends Russian ammonia, a key ingredient in fertilizer, to a Ukrainian Black Sea port.
— An end to restrictions on financial activities linked to Russia's fertilizer companies.
— Renewed access to the international SWIFT banking system for the Russian Agricultural Bank.
The U.N. says it's doing what it can, but those solutions mainly rest with the private sector, where it has little leverage.
The deal has allowed over 30 million metric tons of Ukrainian grain to be shipped, with more than half going to developing nations. China, Spain and Turkey are the biggest recipients, and Russia says that shows food isn't going to the poorest countries.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says Ukrainian corn for animal feed has headed to developed countries, while “a majority” of grain for people to eat has gone to emerging economies.
Even if a “meaningful part” of the shipments goes to developed nations, that “has a positive impact to all countries because it brings prices down," Guterres told reporters in Nairobi, Kenya, this month. "And when you bring prices down, everybody benefits.”
Osnato, the analyst, said markets aren't reacting to Russia’s threats to exit the deal, with wheat recently hitting two-year lows. If the agreement isn’t extended or negotiations drag on, the “loss of Ukraine grains wouldn’t be a disaster” for a month or two, he said.
He says there is “bluster” coming from Russia to push for easing some sanctions because it's shipping record amounts of wheat for the season, and its fertilizers are flowing well, too.
“It’s more about trying to get a little leverage, and they’re doing what they can to put themselves in a better negotiating position,” Osnato said.
Trade flows tracked by financial data provider Refinitiv show that Russia exported just over 4 million tons of wheat in April, the highest volume for the month in five years, following record or near-record highs in several previous months.
Exports since last July reached 32.2 million tons, 34% above the same period from last season, according to Refinitiv. It estimates Russia will ship 44 million tons of wheat in 2022-2023.
The issue is more pressing with Ukraine’s wheat harvest coming up in June and the need to sell that crop in July. Not having a Black Sea shipping corridor in place at that point would “start taking another large chunk of wheat and other grains off the market,” Osnato said.
Ukraine can send its food by land through Europe, so it wouldn’t be completely cut off from world markets, but those routes have a lower capacity than sea shipments and have stirred disunity in the European Union.
Uncertainties like drought in places including Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Syria and East Africa — big importers of food — are likely to keep food prices high, and an end to the U.N. deal wouldn't help.
“Any shock to the markets can cause massive harm with catastrophic ripple effects in countries balancing on the brink of famine," said Shashwat Saraf, emergency director for East Africa at the International Rescue Committee.
“The expiration of the Black Sea Grain Initiative is likely to trigger increased levels of hunger and malnutrition, spelling further disaster for East Africa,” Saraf said.
G-7 leaders likely to focus on the war in Ukraine and tensions in Asia at summit in Hiroshima
The symbolism will be palpable when leaders of the world's rich democracies sit down in Hiroshima, a city whose name evokes the tragedy of war, to tackle a host of challenges including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and rising tensions in Asia.
The attention on the war in Europe comes just days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy completed a whirlwind trip to meet many of the Group of Seven leaders now heading to Japan for the summit starting Friday. That tour was aimed at adding to his country's weapons stockpile and building political support ahead of a widely anticipated counteroffensive to reclaim lands occupied by Moscow's forces.
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“Ukraine has driven this sense of common purpose” for the G-7, said Matthew P. Goodman, senior vice president for economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
He said the new commitments Zelenskyy received just ahead of the summit could push members of the bloc to step up their support even further. “There’s a kind of peer pressure that develops in forums like this,” he explained.
G-7 leaders are also girding for the possibility of renewed conflict in Asia as relations with China deteriorate. They are increasingly concerned, among other things, about what they see as Beijing's growing assertiveness, and fear that China could could try to seize Taiwan by force, sparking a wider conflict. China claims the self-governing island as its own and regularly sends ships and warplanes near it.
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Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida also hopes to highlight the risks of nuclear proliferation during the meeting in Hiroshima, the site of the world’s first atomic bombing.
The prospect of another nuclear attack has been crystalized by nearby North Korea’s nuclear program and spate of recent missile tests, and Russia's threats to use nuclear weapons in its war in Ukraine. China, meanwhile, is rapidly expanding its nuclear arsenal from an estimated 400 warheads today to 1,500 by 2035, according to Pentagon estimates.
Concerns about the strength of the global economy, rising prices and the debt limit crisis in the U.S. will be high on leaders' minds.
G-7 finance ministers and central bank chiefs meeting ahead of the summit pledged to enforce sanctions against Russia, tackle rising inflation, bolster financial systems and help countries burdened by heavy debts.
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The G-7 includes the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada and Italy, as well as the European Union.
That group is also lavishing more attention on the needs of the Global South — a term to describe mostly developing countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America — and has invited countries ranging from South American powerhouse Brazil to the tiny Cook Islands in the South Pacific.
By broadening the conversation beyond the world's richest industrialized nations, the group hopes to strengthen political and economic ties while shoring up support for efforts to isolate Russia and stand up to China's assertiveness around the world, analysts say.
“Japan was shocked when scores of developing countries were reluctant to condemn Russia for its invasion of Ukraine last year," said Mireya Solís, director of the Center for East Asian Policy Studies at The Brookings Institution. “Tokyo believes that this act of war by a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council is a direct threat to the foundations of the postwar international system.”
Getting a diverse set of countries to uphold principles like not changing borders by force advances Japan's foreign policy priorities, and makes good economic sense since their often unsustainable debt loads and rising prices for food and energy are a drag on the global economy, she continued.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will also be attending. His country, which is overtaking China as the world's most populous and sees itself as a rising superpower, is playing host to a meeting of the much broader group of G-20 leading economies later this year.
For host Kishida, this weekend's meeting is an opportunity to spotlight his country’s more robust foreign policy.
The Japanese prime minister made a surprise trip to Kyiv in March, making him the country's first postwar leader to travel to a war zone, a visit freighted with symbolism given Japan's pacifist constitution but one that he was under domestic pressure to take.
Another notable inclusion in Hiroshima is South Korea, a fellow U.S. ally that has rapidly drawn closer to its former colonial occupier Japan as their relations thawed in the face of shared regional security concerns.
U.S. President Joe Biden is expected to hold a separate three-way meeting with his Japanese and South Korean counterparts.
Sung-Yoon Lee, an East Asia expert at Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, said that meeting sends a message to China, Russia and North Korea of “solidarity among the democracies in the region and their resolve to stand up to the increasingly threatening autocracies.”
Biden had been expected to make a historic stop in Papua New Guinea and then travel onward to Australia after the Hiroshima meeting, but he scrapped those latter two stops Tuesday to focus on the debt limit debate back in Washington.
The centerpiece of the Australia visit was a meeting of the Quad, a regional security grouping that the U.S. sees as a counterweight to China’s actions in the region. Beijing has criticized the group as an Asian version of the NATO military alliance.
The decision to host the G-7 in Hiroshima is no accident. Kishida, whose family is from the city, hopes the venue will underscore Japan's “commitment to world peace” and build momentum to “realize the ideal of a world without nuclear weapons,” he wrote on the online news site Japan Forward.
The United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, destroying the city and killing 140,000 people, then dropped a second on Nagasaki three days later, killing another 70,000. Japan surrendered on Aug. 15, effectively ending World War II and decades of Japanese aggression in Asia.
The shell and skeletal dome of one of the riverside buildings that survived the Hiroshima blast are the focal point of the Peace Memorial Park, which leaders are expected to visit.
Report on FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation: Some problems but not the ‘crime of the century’
An investigation into the origins of the FBI's probe into ties between Russia and Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign has finally been concluded, with the prosecutor leading the inquiry submitting a much-awaited report that found major flaws.
The report, the culmination of a four-year investigation into possible misconduct by U.S. government officials, contained withering criticism of the FBI but few significant revelations. Nonetheless, it will give fodder to Trump supporters who have long denounced the Russia investigation, as well as Trump opponents who say the Durham team's meager court record shows their probe was a politically motivated farce.
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A look at the investigation and the report:
WHO IS JOHN DURHAM?
Durham has spent decades as a Justice Department prosecutor, with past assignments including investigations into the FBI's cozy relationship with mobsters in Boston and the CIA's destruction of videotapes of its harsh interrogations of terrorism subjects.
He was appointed in 2019 to investigate potential misconduct by U.S. government officials as they examined Russian election interference in 2016 and whether there was any illegal coordination between the Kremlin and Trump's presidential campaign.
Despite skimpy results — one guilty plea and two acquittals — that failed to live up to Trump's expectations, Durham was able to continue his work well into the Biden administration, thanks in part to William Barr appointing Durham as a Justice Department special counsel shortly before Barr's 2020 resignation as attorney general.
WHY DID THE TRUMP JUSTICE DEPARTMENT THINK SUCH AN APPOINTMENT WAS NECESSARY?
The appointment came weeks after a different special counsel, Robert Mueller, wrapped up his investigation of possible connections between Russia and the Trump campaign. That probe produced more than two dozen criminal cases, including against a half-dozen Trump associates.
Though it did not charge any Trump aide with working with Russia to tip the election, it did find that Russia interfered on Trump's behalf and that the campaign welcomed, rather than discouraged, the help.
From the start, Barr was deeply skeptical of the investigation's foundation, telling Congress that “spying did occur” on the campaign.
He enlisted an outside prosecutor to hunt for potential misconduct at the government agencies who were involved in collecting intelligence and conducting the investigation, even flying with Durham to Italy to meet with officials there as part of the probe.
WERE THERE PROBLEMS WITH THE RUSSIA INVESTIGATION?
Yes, and a Justice Department inspector general inquiry already identified many.
The watchdog report found that FBI applications for warrants to eavesdrop on a former Trump campaign aide, Carter Page, contained significant errors and omitted information that would likely have weakened or undermined the premise of the application.
The cumulative effect of those errors, the report said, was to make it “appear that the information supporting probable cause was stronger than was actually the case.”
Still, the inspector general did not find evidence that investigators acted with political bias and said there was a legitimate basis to open a full investigation into potential collusion, though Durham has disagreed.
WHAT CRIMINAL CASES DID HE BRING AND WHAT WAS THE OUTCOME?
Durham brought three prosecution during his tenure, but only one resulted in a conviction — and that was for a case referred to him by the Justice Department inspector general. None of the three undid core findings by Mueller that Russia had interfered with the 2016 election in sweeping fashion.
A former FBI lawyer, Kevin Clinesmith, pleaded guilty in 2020 to altering an email related to the surveillance of ex-Trump campaign aide. He was given probation.
But two other cases, both involving alleged false statements to the FBI, resulted in acquittals by jury.
Michael Sussmann, a lawyer for the Hillary Clinton campaign, was found not guilty of lying to the FBI during a meeting in which he presented computer data information that he wanted the FBI to investigate. A different jury acquitted Igor Danchenko, a Russian-American analyst, of charges that he lied to the FBI about his role in the creation of a discredited dossier about Trump.
WHAT SPECIFICALLY DID DURHAM FIND?
Durham found that the FBI acted too hastily and relied on raw and unconfirmed intelligence when it opened the Trump-Russia investigation.
He said at the time the probe was opened, the FBI had no information about any actual contact between Trump associates and Russian intelligence officials.
He also claimed that FBI investigators fell prone to “confirmation bias,” repeatedly ignoring or rationalizing away information that could have undercut the premise of their investigation, and he noted that the FBI failed to corroborate a single substantive allegation from a dossier of research that it relied on during the course of the probe.
“An objective and honest assessment of these strands of information should have caused the FBI to question not only the predication for Crossfire Hurricane, but also to reflect on whether the FBI was being manipulated for political or other purposes,” the report said, using the FBI's code name for the Trump-Russia probe. “Unfortunately, it did not.”
HOW DID THE FBI RESPOND?
The FBI pointed out that it had long ago made dozens of corrective actions. Had those measures been in place in 2016, it says, the errors at the center of the report could have been prevented.
It also took pains to note that the conduct in the report took place before the current director, Christopher Wray, took the job in fall 2017.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
It didn't take long for Republicans in Congress to react. Rep. Jim Jordan, who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, said he had invited Durham to testify on Capitol Hill next week. Trump, too, sought to seize on the report, claiming anew in a post on his Truth Social platform that the Durham report had found “the crime of the century” and calling the Russia investigation the “Democrat Hoax.”
Though the FBI says it's already taken some steps to address the problems cited in the report, Durham did say it's possible more reform could be needed. One idea, he said, would be to provide additional scrutiny of politically sensitive investigations by identifying an official who would be responsible for challenging the steps taken in a probe.
He said his team had considered but did not ultimately recommend steps that would curtail the FBI's investigative authorities, including its use of tools under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to eavesdrop on suspected spies or terrorists.