One of Russia’s most senior officials on Wednesday admitted that sanctions on Moscow in response to its unprovoked attack on Ukraine caught Russia, its leaders, and its oligarchs off guard.
“Nobody who was predicting what sanctions the West would pass could have pictured that,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a group of students at Moscow State Institute of International Relations. “It’s just thievery.”
Lavrov’s comments mark the first time a Russian official has admitted to being unprepared for the Western response and come as another high-ranking official in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle calls it quits over the Ukraine invasion.
Anatoly Chubais, Russia’s climate envoy and the man who gave Putin his first job at the Kremlin, resigned, Bloomberg reported.
The 66-year-old is one of the few Soviet-era economic reformers who remained in Putin’s inner circle and maintained ties with Western officials. He is known as the architect of Russia’s 1990s privatizations and profited off of Putin’s rise to power. Chubais had taken high-profile and lucrative jobs at big state companies until he was named envoy for sustainable development in 2021.
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Last week, Arkady Dvorkovich, a senior economic adviser to Dmitry Medvedev during his presidency and Russia’s deputy prime minister until 2018, resigned as head of the Skolkovo technology fund after publicly condemning the Ukraine invasion.
In the four weeks since Putin ordered troops into neighboring Ukraine, the Russian leader has failed to reach his military objective. Instead, he’s felt the sting of global sanctions, watched his country’s monetary system tank, and felt pushback from his own people protesting in the streets.
While pro-Putin businesses continue to be hammered, the European Union announced that strict state aid rules that prevent governments from subsidizing companies will be loosened in an attempt to help businesses offset losses from sanctions on Moscow.
The move comes one day ahead of high-level meetings between President Joe Biden and European leaders in Brussels, where Biden is expected to announce new sanctions against Russia and underscore the importance of closing legal loopholes in the sanctions already leveled against Moscow.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a tailored pitch for military and financial aid to Japan’s Parliament on Wednesday, invoking memories of the 2011 meltdown of the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster, as well as a 1995 chemical weapons attack. Though Japan was the first Asian nation to take action against Russia, it’s unclear what additional steps it can take to help Kyiv. Japan’s constitution limits the nation’s ability to respond militarily, though Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters he might consider sending more humanitarian aid.
In his overnight address, Zelensky said efforts to establish stable humanitarian corridors for residents in the barely standing port city of Mariupol had been “foiled by the Russian occupiers, by shelling or deliberate terror.”
He accused Putin’s army of seizing one humanitarian convoy, while Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said the Russians were holding 11 bus drivers and four rescue workers captive.
One woman who made it out of Mariupol with her husband and son described the situation.
“There’s no connection with the world,” Julia Krytska said. “We couldn’t ask for help. People don’t even have water there.”
Russian forces also bombed and destroyed a bridge in the encircled northern city of Chernihiv, which crosses the Desna River and connects to Kyiv, regional Gov. Viacheslav Chaus said. Deliveries of humanitarian aid and evacuations of civilians went through the ruined bridge. Local authorities have warned of a humanitarian disaster in Chernihiv, with stranded residents lacking access to clean water, heat, and electricity.
Despite heavy losses, Ukrainian forces have been gaining ground in some areas.
They have retaken Makariv, a small town 40 miles west of Kyiv, and have reversed battlefield momentum in some parts of the south.
In Voznesensk, volunteers destroyed an armored convoy and successfully pushed back Russian forces.
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Ukrainian forces are also trying to recapture Kherson, the first city to fall.
