re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict.

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1 a : one associated with another especially in an action : ASSOCIATE, COLLEAGUE our military partners throughout the world

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1.2 million births in 2024 with highest birthrates in Moslem areas. So much for being "Christian Lads"

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These two western energy companies #Uniper and #Fortum are strangely quite over the seizure of their assets in Russia, as they were businesses who elected to stay and continue business as usual while Russians tortured, raped, garrotted and murdered Ukrainians in an illegal invasion of a sovereign neighbour.

Their silence is about brand reputation, which trumps human lives - of course.

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President Putin has issued a decree this week, which sees Russia taking control over western assets. On it’s own, this is not unexpected or unusual. But there is a seismic shift, the assets he is seizing are from Western Companies that elected to stay after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 4th, 2022. This marks a shift in Russian’s position towards Western companies who have continued to trade as normal throughout the war.

The two assets seized are power plant owner operators, the Russian division of German energy business Uniper which include 5 power plants in Russia, EBIT income for Uniper jumped massively in 2022 to 26 Bn Rubles. In Germany Uniper ran into massive liquidity problems during COvid and had to be bailed out - and now it has lost is profitable Russian assets.

Also seized is the Russian division and assets of Fortum, the Finnish energy business. Fortum owns 7 thermal power plants in Russia. It also has a joint venture in wind and solar energy in russia producing 3.4Gw. After the invasion of Ukraine - Fortum announced it would no longer provide additional investment in Russia. The decree issued on April 25th established “temporary control” of all assets of the energy firms, and this sets an expectation for other Western businesses who remained in Russia and have continued to trade business as usual. The decree said Russia needed to take retaliatory action to unspecified actions by the US and other unfriendly countries.

The business have been placed under the control of Rosimushchestvo, a federal government property agency. The agency has issued a warning to others and said more foreign firms could find their assets being seized. Coincidentally on Monday, the CEO of Russian state owned bank VTB PAO, said that Russia should consider taking over foreign assets such as Fortum, only returning them if and when sanctions are lifted.

Tass issued a report Tuesday, saying the assets wold be run in accordance of their importance to the Russian economy. The idea was not to deprive the owners of the assets, it meant though that their management and decisions would now be taken by an external appointed Russian team.

Both Uniper and Fortum have expressed an interest to sell their businesses and exit Russia, but Putin has made the sale of foreign businesses subject to a government commission’s approval and in some circumstances, Putins personal approval - especially where the firms are owned by hostile foreign nations. Basically businesses who remained in Russia are now stuck in Russia and there is no sale exit route for them, without Putins approval.

This is a political hijacking, and the businesses being hijacked arguably deserve every ounce of loss coming their way, they were the ones who continued to trade, make profits and pay taxes to a genocidal regime.

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