UKRAINE WRAP | Russian investigative website says reporter killed in Kyiv shelling

March 24 2022 - 16:33

African students wonder what next after Ukraine war upends education

Nkateko Muyimane and six fellow African students hid in a subway while Russian shells pounded Kharkiv, before fleeing on a train to Budapest they very nearly failed to board. Now their main concern is how to salvage the degrees they sacrificed so much to start.

South African Muyimane, 24, and classmate Mandisa Malindisa, 25, were both studying medicine, with a year to go before graduating. Now, they say, there is no university left.

“It's been bombed out and turned to rubble,” Muyimane said at his brother's apartment in a northern Johannesburg suburb. “Even if we do continue online, medicine is practical: you need to be physically there with the patient.”

March 24 2022 - 16:05

WATCH | Latest videos from the Ukraine war

March 24 2022 - 12:55

Swiss National Bank says it has sold most of its Russia-related assets

The Swiss National Bank (SNB) has sold most of its Russia-related assets and sees only limited risk for the Swiss financial sector from the war in Ukraine, its chairman said on Thursday.

"We had a very small amount of assets related to Russia. In the meantime, we could sell most of those assets so that the exposure to Russia-related assets is close to zero," Thomas Jordan told reporters on a call following the central bank's decision to keep rates on hold.

He also said he did not believe the Russian invasion of Ukraine was a problem for the stability of Switzerland's financial sector.

"The exposure of the Swiss financial sector to Russia is rather limited so the war itself has only a limited impact on banks or financial institutions in Switzerland," Jordan said.

If the war changed the global economy completely, there could be a negative impact on Switzerland, but so far the impact was "very small, very limited".

Jordan said the SNB did not have a business relationship with the Russian central bank and did not hold rouble reserves.

"I assume that the commercial banks would mostly be responsible if the situation made it necessary to provide roubles to the economy, not the central bank," he said in answer to a question.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Russia, the world's largest natural gas producer, would soon require "unfriendly" countries including Switzerland to pay for gas in the country's currency, the rouble. 

-Reuters

March 24 2022 - 10:28

Ukraine urges global protests a month since Russian invasion

Ukraine's leader called for global solidarity on Thursday to mark a month since Russia's invasion began, urging people around the world to take to the streets and calling on leaders meeting in summits in Europe to bolster action against Moscow.

US President Joe Biden has arrived in Brussels for meetings of the Nato alliance, G7 and EU over the invasion that began on February 24 and has led to more than 3.6-million people fleeing from the country.

March 24 2022 - 10:17

Zelenskyy’s 'virtual world tour' proves to be a new weapon in Russia War

As a professional comedian until three years ago, Volodymyr Zelenskyy knows to tailor his material for different audiences. As president of a nation at war, he’s deployed that skill to great effect on a virtual world tour, inspiring and shaming in equal measure.

Beamed onto giant screens in the National Diet of Japan and, later, France’s National Assembly on Wednesday, Zelenskyy invited legislators to connect with Ukraine’s plight by playing to their own history and self-image, just as he has now done at least 10 times since Russia invaded Ukraine exactly a month ago.

March 24 2022 - 07:00

Russian investigative website says reporter killed in Kyiv shelling

Russian investigative website The Insider said on Wednesday that one of its reporters had been killed in Kyiv when Russian forces shelled a suburb where she had been filming damage from an earlier attack.

"Insider journalist Oksana Baulina died during a bombardment in Kyiv while carrying out an editorial assignment ... another civilian died with her," the outlet, whose editorial offices are based in Latvia, said on its website.

At least five journalists have now died since Russian forces invaded Ukraine last month.

Baulina had previously worked for jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation, The Insider said.

Last December the outlet, which is on an official Russian list of "foreign agents," was fined for breaking a law that requires it to attach a disclaimer to its publications and subjects it to increased bureaucratic scrutiny.

-Reuters