#UKRAINERUSSIAWAR. After sanctions, Moscow’s recovery goes through construction, oil and weapons

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Britain banned the import into Russia and the use of sterling in the Russian Federation. In Moscow, Putin instructed the government and the Central Bank to implement the reduction of the preferential mortgage lending rate as quickly as possible.

Putin did this during a meeting of the Presidium of the State Council on the topic of housing, communal services and the development of the housing complex: the Russian president drew the officials’ attention to the problems during construction, which often do not take into account long-term plans, and still do not take into account the landscape.

The action of the national ‘housing and urban environment’ project should be extended until 2030. Up to 95 per cent of Russians would like to improve their living conditions, and the provisions adopted aim to meet them. Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Marat Khusnullin added that the budget loans for the regions amounting to 1 trillion roubles and will enable the introduction of 130 million square metres of housing and bring 2.2 trillion roubles to the budgets. The implementation of the strategy of the construction sector and housing and municipal services up to 2030 will increase the industries’ contribution to GDP by 46% and increase their tax revenues by 30%

Another driving sector of the Russian economy besides oil and gas is the arms industry. The arms factories are working on 25-hour shifts, meaning that even during the shift change there are workers in the factory. All this while British intelligence claims that Moscow will soon be without weapons for the war in Donbass and Ukrainians claim that Ukraine has lost 50% of its heavy weapons since the start of the special operation. This incredible figure was provided by General Vladimir Karpenko of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in an interview with the magazine National Defence: ‘About 1,300 infantry fighting vehicles, 400 tanks and 700 artillery systems have been lost,’ said the commander of army logistics.

Not only that, according to Reuters, the Pentagon has suspended the sale of Grey Eagle attack drones to Ukraine. The US military fears that the highly advanced surveillance equipment will fall into the hands of the Russian army. It is no better for the French: UralVagonZavod in an ironic tone thanked Macron for the captured French ‘Caesar’ self-propelled guns. Earlier, well-known French lawyer and politician Régis de Castelnau claimed that Russia had captured 2 intact French Caesar self-propelled cannons in Ukraine and was now studying them in Uralvagonzavod.

This was also confirmed by Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Yuri Borisov, who said that Western equipment and weapons, which are captured in Ukraine during ongoing military operations, are transferred to specialised Russian institutions for study. Another reason why Russian arms companies are at full capacity, to study and if deemed useful replicate European and US weapons.

In Ukraine meanwhile, the new deputy head of the CAA in the Kherson region has been elected, who is Ekaterina Gubareva, a politician and wife of the first ‘people’s governor’ of the Donbass. All this while the European Parliament adopted a resolution supporting the granting of EU candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova.

Graziella Giangiulio