Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of the world economy, the financial markets, the eurozone and business.
The mission of the International Monetary Fund is starting discussions in Ukraine for the second review of the Fund-supported programme, the global lender said today. (The meetings will be conducted virtually.)
Ukraine hopes that the talks will result in disbursement of $700m under the $5bn IMF programme, and reassure markets that have been rattled by the deepening crisis.
Western nations and Japan unveiled new sanctions yesterday in response to Vladimir Putin’s decision to order troops into separate regions of Eastern Ukraine and to formally recognise them as independent states.
The United States, European Union, UK, Australia, Canada and Japan announced sanctions targeting banks and Russian elites, while the German chancellor Olaf Scholz halted the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, a major gas project from…
