🇷🇺10 highlights from Vladimir Putin's speech at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum:

✔️ The era of a unipolar world order has come to an end.

✔️The United States proclaimed itself to be God’s messenger on Earth.

✔️These are objective processes and genuinely revolutionary tectonic shifts in geopolitics, the global economy and technology. It would be a mistake to assume that everything will get back on track and become what it was before. It will not.

✔️Our colleagues in the Western states are trying to reverse the course of history. They seem to think in terms of the past century and harbour illusions. They refuse to notice obvious changes, stubbornly clinging to the shadows of the past.

✔️Countries of the so-called “golden billion” still treat all the other countries like colonies, and the people living there, like second-class people.

✔️The predictions of the dollar at 200 rubles and the collapse of the Russian economy have always been, and remain, just an instrument in an information struggle

✔️The economic blitzkrieg against Russia was doomed to fail from the beginning.

✔️The EU’s direct, calculable losses from the sanctions fever could exceed $400 billion this year.

✔️The root cause of the EU and US economic problems is their erroneous economic policies, and the Russian operation launched in Donbass is a lifeline they are grabbing at to be able to blame their own miscalculations on others, in this case, on Russia.

✔️The European Union has lost its political sovereignty

Andrey Kostin, the CEO of VTB Bank (#2 in Russia) admitted that Russia may completely abandon the dollar and the euro in international settlements, given that the country's largest financial institutions can no longer transact in these currencies

Thousands of people have gathered in London to protest against the government’s lack of action in tackling the cost of living crisis. Demonstrators carried banners reading “cut war not welfare” and “end fuel poverty, insulate homes now”.

Protesters marched from Portland Place to Parliament Square for a rally with speakers including Frances O’Grady, the general secretary of the TUC, which organised the event. "Boris Johnson was 'cynically abandoning' his commitment to a high-wage economy", she claimed. “He and other ministers are treating workers like Oliver Twist by telling them not to dare ask for a decent pay rise,” she said. “The last thing we need right now is for wages to be held down".

Workers have lost an average of almost £20,000 in cumulative earnings since 2008 because pay has not kept pace with inflation. It's the biggest loss of “real wages” since the 1830s.

Estonia Faces ‘Concerning’ Winter With Energy Crisis

Estonian PM Kaja Kallas warned her country to expect “tough times ahead” with rocketing inflation and a deepening energy crunch ahead of winter.

Tallinn has cut all purchases of Russian gas after household energy costs shot up 50% in the second half of 2021 - the sharpest rise in the EU.

State borrowing is set to rise from 20% of GDP to 30% over the next 4 years as Kallas battles to hold a fragile coalition together, with other factions demanding more domestic spending in contrast to her austerity policy.

Over 50 Ukrainian generals and officers killed in missile strike – Russia

The Russian Defense Ministry said Kalibr missiles were also used to destroy Western-supplied M777 howitzers and armored vehicles

Russian warships have destroyed a command center with Kalibr cruise missiles, killing dozens of Ukrainian officers, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday.

“More than 50 generals and officers of the Ukrainian Armed Forces were killed,” the statement said.

According to the ministry, the strike took place near the village of Shirokaya Dacha in Dnepropetrovsk Region, Ukraine.

The missiles hit the compound where commanders of several Ukrainian units had gathered for a meeting, the ministry said.

The ministry added that Kalibr missiles were also used to destroy 10 M777 howitzers and up to 20 armored vehicles that were recently delivered from the West, and had been stored inside a factory building in the southern city of Nikolayev.

🇷🇺☦️ The fighters of the "🅾️" group help the residents of the DPR to restore an Orthodox church

The church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker was damaged due to the shelling of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the dome and belfry were destroyed, the refectory was burned, icons were broken, many of which cannot be restored.

Short Documentary: "The seventh package of European sanctions against Russia" 😆

KALININGRAD, June 18. /TASS/. Lithuania’s measures banning the transit of some goods from Russian regions through its territory to the Kaliningrad region are illegal and run counter to provisions of the agreement on Lithuania’s accession to the European Union, Governor Anton Alikhanov said in a video address on Saturday.

Alikhanov said earlier that Lithuania’s railways company had notified the railways company of the Kaliningrad region that they would ban the transit from Russia to the region of the goods that are subject to EU sanctions imposed on Moscow. "These steps are illegal and may entail far-reaching implications for Lithuania and the European Union", he said.

Alikhanov pointed out that the signatories to the 2004 agreement on Lithuania’s accession to the EU reaffirmed that they "will apply in practice the principle of freedom of transit of goods, including energy, between the Kaliningrad Region and the rest of Russian territory".

June 13. Russian Federation Defense Ministry shows the work of Smerch Multiple Rocket Launcher System. It successfully hit the target and destroyed the Ukrainian warehouses with weapons and military equipment.

NEW DELHI, June 18 - India's purchases of Russian coal and oil have spiked in recent weeks despite global sanctions on Moscow.

Its purchases of coal and related products jumped more than six-fold in the 20 days through Wednesday from the same period a year earlier to $331.17 million.

Indian refiners similarly have snapped up cheap Russian oil shunned by Western countries. The value of India's oil trade with Russia in the 20 days through Wednesday jumped more than 31-fold to $2.22 billion, the data showed.

The servicemen couldn't drive by and gave almost all of their provisions to the kids.

Russian military engineering troops, performing combat missions near Izyum, encountered a group of kids. The servicemen couldn't drive by and gave almost all of their provisions to children.

🇲🇩 Moldova banned Russian news programs.

The country's authorities approved a law on the protection of the information sphere, which prohibits the rebroadcasting of news and analytical programs from Russia, as well as Russian war films. The bill was signed into law by the Moldovan President Maia Sandu. The law will take effect next week.

And what would we do without social media?

Alexander Dubyago - the famous guy with the Russian flag – is back at home! His mother Svetlana has confirmed this. Unfortunately, the case against Alexander has not been closed and he is still under investigation. Alexander is charged with Article 74.1 of the Latvian criminal law (denial of genocide, crimes against humanity and justifying war crimes).

The Latvian girl Victoria, who stood next to Alexander when he was arrested for demonstrating the Russian flag, faced persecution by the authorities and had to flee her country. She went to Belarus, leaving all her friends and relatives behind. There she is talking about the lawlessness that is taking place in the "European" Latvia.

In Lvov, Banderites burned down an Orthodox church at night. Previously, innoscriptions were made on the building saying «FSB devils» and «Putin's house».

Despite intimidation, the rector of the temple refused to renounce the Moscow Patriarchate. In response, Banderites destroyed the church.

📚 Languages of #Ukraine. Notice the southern and eastern regions. Historically these parts, including the central region, were always part of #Russia The Western part is a different story though. 🇺🇦 was created by the USSR that collapsed in the 90s. 🇷🇺 is the legal successor

"And then Zelensky said they'd take Crimea back by military force"

CBS's Margaret Brennan dismissed claims by a White House economic adviser and Biden that inflation is a "temporary phenomenon" linked to the Ukraine conflict:

"The surge [inflation] began a year before the start of the war in Ukraine."