The State Customs Service will confiscate goods and vehicles when trying to smuggle under the guise of humanitarian aid instead of a fine, as it was in peacetime, first deputy head of the department Oleksandr Shutsky said.
“The state customs and the military administration warn: if earlier it was just a protocol on violation of customs rules and a fine, now the goods will be confiscated, and vehicles will also be confiscated,” he said during a press briefing in Zakarpattia region on Thursday.
Shutsky added that the confiscated property would subsequently be transferred to the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the military administration.
The official specified that since the beginning of the full-scale military aggression of the Russian Federation, there have been few attempts to pass off smuggling as humanitarian aid. Thus, the smugglers tried to carry household chemicals, food, hygiene products, and luxury goods under a simplified procedure without customs payments.
“We see that attempts have begun to cover (commercial deliveries) with public organizations and humanitarian supplies. Therefore, we warn,” he stressed.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov discussed the issue of the 24-hour ceasefire, but made no progress on this issue.
“We also discussed the issue of a 24-hour ceasefire to resolve the most urgent humanitarian issues. We have not made any progress on this, because it seems that in Russia, other people make decisions on this issue,” Kuleba said at a press conference following the talks with Foreign Ministers of Russia and Turkey Sergei Lavrov and Mevlut Cavusoglu in Antalya on Thursday.
France is allocating EUR 100 million to help Ukraine and neighboring countries, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs has reported.
“Having faced with a humanitarian emergency, France is allocating EUR 100 million to help Ukraine and neighboring countries. About 100 tonnes of cargo have already been delivered to the victims of the conflict,” the French Foreign Ministry said on Twitter on Wednesday.
Philip Morris International Inc. (PMI) is suspending planned investments in Russia, including new product launches, investments in innovation, as well as commercial and manufacturing activities, the tobacco concern said in a statement.
PMI has also stepped up plans to reduce manufacturing operations in Russia amid supply chain disruptions and changing regulations, the company said.
“Given the situation, the board of directors and management have decided to halt all of our planned investments in Russia and to step up plans to reduce our production operations. We will support our employees in Russia during this period, including by continuing to pay their wages,” PMI CEO Jacek Olczak said in the statement.
PMI’s Russian business in 2021 accounted for nearly 10% of cigarette and heated tobacco sales, and around 6% of PMI’s global revenue.
The company started operating in Russia in 1992, opening a representative office in the country. PMI has more than 3,200 employees in Russia.
PMI owns a tobacco factory in the country’s Leningrad Region, CJSC Philip Morris Izhora; and it owns Philip Morris Sales and Marketing that distributes cigarettes through a branch network in more than 100 Russian cities. Last autumn, PMI decided to close a factory in the Krasnodar Territory amid a shrinking tobacco market.
The brand portfolio includes Marlboro, L&M, Bond Street, Parliament, and others. The company also produces tobacco sticks for its Iqos tobacco heating systems.
PMI’s share in the Russian tobacco market is 31.7% according to data for the fourth quarter 2022.
The war launched by Russia against Ukraine has triggered one of the fastest growing refugee emergencies in the history of UN observations: the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Ukraine could reach 6.7 million, up from 854,000 before start of the war.
The Humanitarian Country Team (HCT) predicts that a military offensive could displace up to 6.7 million people within Ukraine, 4.3 million of whom will need life-saving humanitarian assistance, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said on Wednesday.
According to it, prior to the Russian invasion, Ukrainian authorities registered 1.46 million IDPs, of which 854,000 lived in government-controlled areas, in addition to 1.7 million affected by the conflict. Most of them were displaced after the outbreak of hostilities in southeastern Ukraine in 2014.
The office adds that there were also 35,000 stateless persons and 5,000 refugees and asylum seekers in Ukraine, mostly from Afghanistan, whose need for OHCHR assistance is expected to become even more acute as the situation develops.
According to the organization’s estimates, in addition to 6.7 million IDPs, there will also be about 4 million refugees from Ukraine, while before the war there were only 53,000.
In line with an initial request for $270 million in financial support, OHCHR intends to assist 2.1 million IDPs over an initial three-month period (March-May this year).
In addition, the agency has requested $240 million in funding to help 2.4 million refugees in the first six months, which will be distributed to their host countries.
In general, the UN estimates the financial needs for an urgent response to the situation in Ukraine (United Nations Emergency Appeal for the Ukraine Situation) at $1.7 billion, of which $1.1 billion for Ukraine and $550.6 million for countries that have accepted refugees.
OHCHR is calling on the donor community to support people in dire need in Ukraine and neighboring countries at this critical time.
The global analytical agency in the field of higher education Quacquarelli Symonds, which compiles one of the most popular university rankings in the world QS World University Rankings, has decided to stop cooperation with Russian and Belarusian institutions of higher education in connection with the war unleashed against Ukraine.
“We are outraged by the war that Russia is waging against the Ukrainian people. We believe in the power of international education to promote understanding and cooperation, but now we are seeing how university campuses have experienced destruction, and our partners, colleagues and friends have been displaced and affected by a humanitarian catastrophe,” the founder and CEO of the company said in an official statement.
The report notes that in response to the actions of the Russian Federation, the organization is taking a number of measures.
In particular, it supports, through advisory services and mobility programs, in particular through the QS TopUniversities portal, Ukrainian and foreign students and applicants affected by the war.
Also, through various platforms (during summits, through the website and publications), it organizes discussions among the international educational community about the crisis caused by the war and the search for opportunities to support the affected people, and also ceases to cooperate with new clients in the Russian Federation and suspends active interaction with Russian clients, previously collaborated with.
In addition, a decision was made not to include Russian and Belarusian universities in the new university rankings and to stop advertising Russian universities or the Russian Federation as a place to study.
