Free Republic

Russia has approved a temporary ban on the export of gasoline, a representative for the country's Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak told local media on Tuesday. Beginning May 1, Russia will impose a six-month ban on gasoline exports to allow the country to "offset the booming demand for petroleum products," the official told Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin in an internal letter in January, publication RBC reported. Fuel shortages have been reported nationwide in Russia, which is one of the world's biggest producers of oil and gas. Wholesale fuel prices have soared across the country, and Ukraine has ramped up...

Latvian President Edgars Rinkēvičs, Prime Minister Evika Siliņa, Seimas Speaker Daiga Mieriņa and Foreign Minister Krišjānis Kariņš have called on residents to express solidarity with the people of Ukraine and join in a minute of silence on Saturday, 24 February, at 09:00. "Russia knows that it will not be able to break Ukraine in a fair fight on the battlefield. Russia therefore resorts to all forms of crime: it attacks civilians, bombs cities, abducts Ukrainian children. It is putting pressure on Ukraine’s international partners in the hope that we will all tire out as the war persists," the Latvian State...

Ivan Sechin, the son of Russian state-owned oil giant Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin, died on February 5 at the age of 35, it has been reported. -snip- The VChK-OGPU outlet, which purports to have inside information from Russian security forces, also reported on Sechin's death. Citing an unnamed source, it said that at approximately 4.30 a.m. on February 5, Sechin "complained that he felt bad and was suffocating." "The man fell on the bed and lost consciousness. Those around him carried Ivan to the floor and tried to provide primary resuscitation measures," the Telegram channel said, adding that an ambulance...

As Americans are preoccupied with staying afloat amid a coronavirus-related shutdown, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has finally begun delivering on an investigation he promised months ago. The origins of the FBI’s politicized “Spygate” counterintelligence operation against the 2016 Trump campaign. With uncertainties over how badly the coronavirus shutdown will harm the economy and how long that harm will last taking up most of our time and the oxygen in news cycles, what Graham’s doing is important because the objective is to ensure that what happened to President Trump does not happen again. Ever. Investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson interviewed Graham this...