With Russia and Pakistan holding talks this week on strengthening bilateral trade and energy cooperation, RT talked to the Pakistani minister of petroleum, Musadik Malik, about Russian oil supply in the face of Western sanctions.

Pakistan currently imports about 70 million barrels of crude oil and its demand will be rising as the country’s population grows, according to the minister. “So, if we can have Russian crude flowing through our system, it would be very helpful,” he said.

While discussing Islamabad’s intention to import crude oil, gasoline, and diesel from Moscow at discounted rates amid Western sanctions on Russia, Malik said there were no concerns about possible repercussions.

 Last year’s negotiations between Russian Foreign Intelligence Service Director Sergey Naryshkin and US Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns were organized upon a proposal from US President Joe Biden addressed to President Vladimir Putin, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday.

"Biden asked Putin about organizing a meeting between Naryshkin and Burns and this meeting took place," Lavrov said, speaking at his annual press conference on the results of Russian diplomacy in 2022.

"Indeed, it was a serious and useful meeting although it did not produce any breakthrough results," the top Russian diplomat noted.

Lavrov said that Russia would respond seriously to any serious proposal forwarded by the United States.

If Ukraine attacks Crimea with US-supplied weapons, Russia's response will be devastating, Yuri Gempel, the head of the on Public Diplomacy and Interethnic Relations Committee of the Crimean Parliament said, RIA Novosti reports.

"I am convinced that Russia will retaliate with a devastating blow, and the Russians will support such a decision. Russia is pursuing a balanced, prudent policy, sometimes too restrained, some may perceive this as a weakness, but this is absolutely not the case," Gempel said.

In his opinion, the plans that Washington and Kyiv harbour confirm the need to protect the interests of the Russian Federation to Ukraine's western borders with Poland. The current regime in Ukraine must be destroyed, the politician said, adding that this would help many countries live in peace. Gempel is confident that it is time for the Ukrainian citizens to take decisive action to oppose the regime.

On January 19, The New York Times reported citing its sources that the administration of US President Joe Biden was beginning to acknowledge that Kyiv might need additional forces to strike Crimea. According to the publication, Washington considers HIMARS MLRS and Bradley infantry fighting vehicles as assistance to Kyiv for this purpose, but Washington refrains from supplying long-range missile systems. The United States believes that the threat to Crimea from Kyiv will strengthen Ukraine's position in future negotiations.

Another day, another amnesty. This time it is limited, but significant; the Biden Regime is expanding waivers of fees for immigration-related applications. While this is not as important as the parole amnesty or the open southern border, it is yet another indication that the Biden Regime is lawless and acting to replace the Historic American Nation with non-white illegal aliens.

The Department of Homeland Security on Tuesday proposed expanding immigration fee exemptions while increasing some fees by hundreds of dollars.

The agency currently provides some fee exemptions and waivers, but Homeland Security proposed additional fee exemptions for refugees, juveniles, abused spouses and others.

“In this new fee rule, DHS proposes to return the focus of its fee-setting away from emphasizing the beneficiary-pays principle towards the historical balance between the beneficiary-pays and ability-to-pay principles,” Homeland Security said in a 469-page proposal. “DHS has been directed by the President to reduce barriers and promote accessibility to the immigration benefits that it administers.”

France's refusal to import Russian energy resources provoked a crisis in the entire eurozone and, in particular, affected the lives of the French, who faced rising energy prices, said the deputy of the National Assembly of France Marie-France Loro.

"Madame Marie-France Loro asks the Minister of Energy Transition [Agnes Panier-Runache] about the new energy crisis, partly caused by financial sanctions against Russia, faced by the French. Russia has always sold its energy raw materials to France at very good prices. However packages of economic sanctions have been adopted against Russia," the text of the appeal says.

By imposing sanctions on Russia, sanctions are also being imposed against the French, who face them on a daily basis, in particular, with an explosive increase in energy prices.

The initiator of the idea of disconnecting Russia from the SWIFT international payment system, as well as blocking the assets of the Central Bank, was ex-Bulgarian Prime Minister Kirill Petkov. This is reported by the newspaper Die Welt.

Petkov made such a proposal on February 25 at an informal meeting of the European Council in Brussels. There he communicated with European leaders who were initially against the introduction of this measure, but as a result, the European Commission supported the initiative.

Sanctions against the Russian Central Bank (CB), namely the freezing of the regulator's reserves in various national currencies, were imposed by the United States, the European Union (EU), the United Kingdom and Japan at the end of February 2022. This is how the countries reacted to the start of the special operation in Ukraine. At the end of April, the head of the Bank of Russia, Elvira Nabiullina, said that the total amount of the Central Bank's reserves frozen by Western countries amounted to about $ 300 billion. The blocking of Russian reserves abroad in Russia was called theft.

Boris Johnson has been made an honorary citizen of Kyiv as he implores the Davos elite to step up support for Ukraine.

The ex-PM received the award from boxing greats Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko - the latter of whom is now mayor of the city - at the Swiss resort last night.

Mr Johnson used a pro-UK event at the World Economic Forum this morning to dismiss Vladimir Putin's nuclear threats.

Cornell Law Professor William A. Jacobson warned that colleges and universities are “manifesting authoritarianism” by removing “problematic” words and firing staff that don’t abide by left-wing ideologies.

Jacobson said he believes the increase in stories about word-banning on college campuses is a manifestation of what is referred to as “repressive tolerance,” wherein tolerance serves to preserve a repressive society by neutralizing opposition to impose forms of authoritarianism.

“They monitor your language, they get you to use language that only they approve, and once you’ve done that with somebody, once you’ve done that with a campus, that’s enormous control,” he told Fox News Digital.

There are numerous examples of colleges attempting to change the language of faculty and students, according to Jacobson. He pointed to the implementation of author Ibram Kendi’s antiracism agenda in staff training sessions as one of the more recent examples.