Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni will pay an official visit to Kiev on Tuesday, February 21, during which he will meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, il Fatto Quotidiano reported.
“The visit was announced and postponed several times. But Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni wants to demonstrate unconditional support for Ukraine (by Rome – IFU) outside of Italy,” the report says.
It notes that during his visit Meloni is likely to announce a new military aid package for Ukraine.
Reuters, in its turn, wrote that Meloni will go on a visit to Kiev on Monday, February 20.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed the information about the visit of his American counterpart Joe Biden to Kyiv.
“Joseph Biden, welcome to Kyiv! Your visit is an extremely important manifestation of support for all Ukrainians,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized.
In turn, the White House commented on the meeting between Biden and Zelenskyy.
“I will announce another shipment of critical equipment, including artillery munitions, anti-tank systems, and air surveillance radars, to help protect the Ukrainian people from aerial bombardment.
And I will share that later this week we will announce additional sanctions against elites and companies that try to evade or engage the Russian war machine,” the White House said in a statement on its website.
After his visit to Kyiv, the US president will travel to Poland.
Oil prices are rising Monday morning, recovering from last week’s sharp decline.
The price of April futures on London’s ICE Futures Exchange stood at $83.38 a barrel by 7:05 a.m., $0.38 (0.46%) above the previous session’s closing price. Those contracts fell by $2.14 (2.5%) to $83 a barrel at the close of trading last Friday.
The price of WTI futures for March at the electronic exchange of New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) by that time is $76.68 per barrel, which is $0.34 (0.45%) above the final value of the previous session. At that time the contract went down in price by $2.15 (2.7%) to $76.34 per barrel.
Brent was down by 3.9% and WTI by 4.2% at the end of last week. The main negative factor for world markets, including oil market, was tough rhetoric of representatives of major central banks of the world, which increased the likelihood of new rate hikes, writes MarketWatch.
“Oil has been caught between a hammer and anvil, or in other words, between the Fed and a hard landing,” said SPI Asset Management managing partner Stephen Innes.
Meanwhile, the number of active oil rigs in the U.S. fell by two last week to 607, oil services company Baker Hughes reported. The number of gas rigs increased by one unit to 151.
Trading volume on Monday is likely to be lower than usual as U.S. exchanges are closed in observance of Presidents’ Day.
Metallurgical enterprises of Ukraine in January this year reduced revenues from ferrous metals exports 6.2 times compared to the same period last year – to $165.690m.
According to the statistics released by the State Customs Service (SCS), ferrous metals accounted for 5.29% of total revenues from the export of goods during this period against 17.01% in January-2022.
At the same time, Ukraine reduced imports of similar products by 50% to $68.593 million in January this year.
In addition, Ukraine reduced exports of metal products by 48.8% to $62.127 million in January, while imports of metal products decreased by 35.2% – to $51.263 million.
As reported, metallurgical enterprises of Ukraine in 2022, revenues from exports of ferrous metals decreased by 67.5% compared to 2021 – to $4 billion 533.088 million – ferrous metals during this period amounted to 10.26% of total revenues from the export of goods against 20.49% in 2021. In December 2022, the proceeds from exports of ferrous metals amounted to $173.944 million, while in November – $205.647 million.
At the same time, last year, Ukraine reduced imports of similar products by 38.3% – to $954.387 million. In December, it was imported by $89.275 million.
In addition, in 2022, Ukraine reduced exports of metal products by 18.6% – to $ 1 billion 52.512 million, in December, they were delivered for $ 69.285 million.
Imports of metal products last year decreased by 42.9% – to $643.162 million (in December – $67.705 million).
Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv partially cancelled the arrest of accounts of Poltava Mining and Processing Plant PJSC (PGOK) of the mining company Ferrexpo plc with assets in Ukraine to pay salaries to employees, provide assistance to internally displaced persons and mobilized workers, ensure the production process.
According to the company’s press release, the court made the respective decision on February 16 this year.
At the same time, the court partially satisfied the company’s claims. In particular, PGOK is allowed to pay salaries and related charges (alimony, sick pay, benefits for families of employees killed during the defense of Ukraine, etc.) for full-time employees, payment for rent of municipal and state property, goods and services of state and municipal enterprises, institutions and utilities.
In addition, it is allowed to make payments related to the payment of local taxes and fees, as well as payments for the purchase of food, groceries, rent of premises for accommodation of internally displaced persons.
The company’s press release welcomes the court’s decision, but states that the court rejected the possibility of payments for goods and services received from contractors. PGOK believes that the extension of the ban on making these payments jeopardizes the work of such companies, because for most of them, PGOK is the main customer.
In addition, the services and goods provided by these contractors are critical to ensure stable production activities of the company. And a possible reduction in production volumes or its shutdown would entail non-compliance of the state with taxes and employees with stable salaries.
PGOK also insists on the removal of the seizure of financial operations aimed at social support of Ukraine. According to the company, in 2022 PGOK allocated more than 500 million UAH to help 8 regions that suffered the most from the Russian aggression as part of the program of humanitarian support for Ukraine. The company considers it extremely important today to continue all planned social and humanitarian programs as part of the PGOK Charitable Foundation.
PGOK points to the importance of the full unblocking of accounts to ensure the full operation of the enterprise and is taking all necessary measures to this end.
As reported, by the decision of Shevchenkivskiy district court of Kyiv on February 3, 2023 all accounts of Poltava Mining and Processing Enterprise PJSC and expenditures, except for the payment of taxes to the state budget, were seized. This decision made it impossible to pay salaries and an annual bonus, which the company planned to make on February 7, 2023.
Later, the court adjusted the ruling, allowing the payment of wages, explaining the restrictions on its payment by a clerical error. However, the adjusted determination did not allow payments to accounts at other banks where the wage bill was opened, so it was difficult to comply. Despite this, as of February 16, 2023, salaries for January 2023 and the annual bonus for all full-time employees of PGOK had been paid in full, the company noted.
It was also reported that a court in Ukraine arrested the accounts of PGOK Ferrexpo at the request of the prosecutor’s office in the case of underpayment of rent for iron ore mining in 2018-2021. The company denies the fraud.
Earlier, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and the Bureau of economic security (BEB) reported the suspicion of the chief accountant of PGOK Ferrexpo, the majority owner of which is a businessman and former MP Konstantin Zhevago.
“The SBU together with the BEB and the Office of the Prosecutor General reported the suspicion of one of the top managers of PGOK, which is part of the Ferrexpo group of companies and is owned by a Ukrainian fugitive oligarch,” the SBU said in a message on Telegram channel.
“BEB detectives reported the suspicion of the chief accountant of PGOK. The company is part of the Ferrexpo group of companies, which is owned by a billionaire from the Monaco battalion,” in turn stated the BEB.
According to law enforcement officials, due to the actions of the top manager, the company avoided paying to the state budget rent payments for the use of subsoil deposits of iron ores in the amount of about 2 billion UAH.
“The investigation found that the official during 2018-2021 entered false information in the official documents of the enterprise. This and caused significant losses to the state”, – was specified in the message.
Criminal proceedings were opened under part 3 of article 212 (evasion of taxes, fees) and part 1 of article 366 (official forgery) of the Criminal code of Ukraine.
The SSU and the BEB note that the conclusions of the comprehensive expertise conducted during the pre-trial investigation confirmed the amount of the damage to the state budget of 2 billion hryvnias.
Law enforcers continue to identify all the persons who might be involved in the crime.
Ferrexpo is an iron ore company with assets in Ukraine.
Ferrexpo owns 100% of the shares in Yeristovskiy GOK LLC and 99.9% in Belanovskiy GOK LLC. Before the court ruling in September 2022, Ferrexpo also owned 100% of Poltava Mining and Processing Division PJSC.
Armenia and Turkey have agreed to accelerate the process of dialogue to finally open the border between the countries, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan said.
“Concrete agreements have been reached. There is a decision to speed up the process of dialogue to finally open the border between Armenia and Turkey,” Mirzoyan said at a government meeting on Thursday, presenting the results of his February 15 visit to Turkey.
According to him, an agreement has also been reached to open the Armenian-Turkish border for citizens of third countries and holders of Armenian and Turkish diplomatic passports before the start of the tourist season.
The minister also said that Armenian rescuers sent to Turkey will return home through the land border on Thursday.
For his part, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said the republic’s actions to help Turkey are exclusively humanitarian in nature.
“It is absolutely unacceptable to criticize us, because I cannot imagine a situation where millions of people in a neighboring country need help and someone can be indifferent. This is unacceptable,” Pashinyan said.
On the other hand, he said, Armenia emphasizes the need to change the quality of relations in the region.
“I regret that a certain change is taking place in the face of such a tragedy. But perhaps human tragedies make people more understandable to each other. This is an objective reality. I hope it can become a new starting point for establishing relations between Armenia and Turkey,” Pashinyan said.
He also said that the preliminary design of the reconstruction of Ani bridge on the border between Armenia and Turkey is ready.
