PT Pupuk Indonesia (Persero) memastikan stok pupuk subsidi tahun 2022 aman dan pendistribusian berjalan baik. Foto: Pupuk Indonesia
Pupuk subsidi masih menjadi permasalahan petani. Jumlahnya yang sangat terbatas, kerap kali mengikat leher petani. Sebab, mereka harus membeli pupuk non-subsidi dengan harga yang jauh lebih mahal. Itu dilakukan untuk memenuhi kebutuhan pupuk mereka.
Seperti yang dialami oleh Suwardi, petani di Desa Pagerngumbuk, Kecamatan Wonoayu, Sidoarjo. Di 2022 lalu, jatah pupuk subsidi yang ia dapatkan hanya 200 kilogram. Padahal, kebutuhan satu hektar lahan pertaniannya sebanyak 500 kilogram.
“Karena kurang, jadi kami harus beli pupuk non-subsidi. Harganya sangat mahal sekali. 1 kwintal harganya Rp 1,1 juta. Jadi, setiap kali musim tanam, saya harus nambah pupuk,” kata Suwardi, Rabu, 11 Januari 2023.
Sementara, ketua kelompok tani Sumber Maler 3 ini memiliki dua hektar sawah. Artinya, kebutuhan pupuknya sebanyak 1 ton. Dirinya pun harus mengeluarkan uang sebesar Rp 6,6 juta untuk pembelian pupuk non-subsidi.
Di kelompok tani yang dipimpinnya itu, memiliki 18 hektar tanah. Dikelolah oleh beberapa petani. Sementara, di desa Pagerngumbuk, terdapat tiga kelompok tani. Dua kelompok tani lainnya, memiliki kisaran luas lahan sebesar 30 hektar.
Sementara itu, Sub Koordinator Pupuk, Bidang Sarana dan Prasarana, Dinas Pertanian dan Ketahanan Pangan Jatim Setianti menjelaskan, kuota alokasi pupuk subsidi sebenarnya ditentukan oleh Kementerian Pertanian. Itu diberikan menyesuaikan permintaan dari petani.
“Sebenarnya dari Dinas Pertanian kabupaten/kota yang mengajukan itu. Dilakukan menggunakan aplikasi. Bahkan, kebutuhan itu diajukan dari petani melalui petugas yang ditunjuk. Dimasukkan ke website dan itu langsung ke kementerian,” ucapnya.
Hanya saja, dalam aplikasi itu sudah ada aturan-aturan siapa saja yang berhak mendapatkan pupuk subsidi. Seperti, memiliki maksimal dua hektar lahan. Aplikasi itu juga hanya membaca satu nomor induk kependudukan (NIK).
“Sehingga, pemilik NIK yang telah meningga, otomatis terhapus. Atau, ada juga yang terbaca memiliki lahan di tempat lain. Tetapi, namanya aplikasi kan kadang eror. Sehingga, banyak yang akhirnya tidak mendapatkan jatah pupuk subsidi,” terangnya.
Setiap tahun pun, kuota pupuk Jatim selalu mengalami penurunan setiap tahunnya. Di 2021 misalnya, kuota pupuk padat yang diberikan Kementerian Pertanian sebanyak 2,3 juta ton. Sedangkan pupuk cair sebanyak 177.609 liter.
Namun, di 2022 kuota yang diberikan hanya 1,9 juta ton pupuk padat dan 48.031 liter. Di 2021 kembali mengalami penurunan kuota. Hanya menjadi 1,6 juta ton pupuk padat. “Di sisi lain, penyediaan kuota pupuk subsidi ini mengikuti budget yang ada,” tambahnya.
Ketua DPD Perempuan Tani HKTI (Himpunan Kerukunan Tani Indonesia) Jawa Timur Lia Istifhama menambahkan, dalam kondisi saat ini, petani selalu kalah melawan keadaan. Sehingga, petani menurutnya perlu pembelaan. Bukan hanya sekedar pendampingan.
Pun saat ini, masih banyak masalah yang melilit sektor pertanian. Ini membuat program swasembada pangan pemerintah, sulit terwujudkan. Padahal, di negeri agraris seperti Indonesia, swasembada pangan harusnya menjadi keniscayaan.
Menurut keponakan Gubernur Jatim Khofifah Indar Parawansa itu, permasalahan pupuk subsidi tadi membutuhkan terobosan tersendiri.
Misalnya: petani di Indonesia ini, dalam usulan Rencana Definitif Kebutuhan Kelompok (RDKK) mencapai 22,57 juta ton sampai 26,18 juta ton pupuk. Jika angka itu dipenuhi, maka, pemerintah harus menyiapkan subsidi anggaran Rp 63 triliun hingga 65 triliun.
Namun faktanya, pemerintah hanya mampu mengalokasikan anggaran berkisar Rp 25 triliun sampai Rp 32 triliun. Atau kisaran 8,87 juta ton - 9,55 juta ton pupuk subsidi. Dengan kata lain, kebutuhan yang dapat terpenuhi, hanya 37- 42 persen.
Russian Airborne Troops blocked the city of Soledar from the north and south, with fighting going on inside the city itself, Russian Defense Ministry Spokesman Igor Konashenkov told reporters Wednesday.
According to Acting Head of the Donetsk People’s Republic Denis Pushilin, downtown Soledar is already under the control of Russian forces. Earlier on Tuesday, businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin announced that fighters from the Wagner PMC control the entire Soledar territory.
Prigozhin left salt in Soledar: "so that America does not think that we are fighting for it"
TASS Media has collected the latest reports about the fight for the city.
What is going on in Soledar
On Tuesday, Pushilin claimed that Soledar’s city center had been taken under control by Russian forces, who were already conducting a mop-up operation in the Western part of the city.
Later, Prigozhin claimed that the Wagner PMC controls the entire city, with a cauldron (pocket) in the city center. He promised to provide the number of captured Ukrainian servicemen later.
According to Apti Alaudinov, commander of the ‘Akhmat’ special forces unit and deputy commander of the LPR People’s Militia 2nd Army Corps, it will be possible to talk about the total liberation of Soledar by late Wednesday or on Thursday at the latest. The remaining Ukrainian forces in the city "will not be able to change anything anymore," he said.
Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov urged reporters to wait for official statements on Soledar, but noted the "positive dynamic" of the special military operation.
Situation around Soledar
Currently, Russian forces are fighting for Artyomovsk, or Bakhmut, located south of Soledar. According to Alaudinov, fighters from the Wagner PMC "took ‘all logistics routes’ in this city under control."
On Wednesday, the Russian Defense Ministry reported the liberation of the nearby settlement of Podgorodnoye.
What’s next
According to Pushilin, the liberation of Soledar will increase Russian forces’ ability to take control of Artyomovsk and Seversk, which will open the path towards Slavyansk and Kramatorsk
the largest Donbass cities currently under Kiev’s control.
He noted that Russian forces are destroying Ukrainian defensive lines, adding that a "breaking point for liberation of the entire Donetsk People’s Republic is being prepared."
Pushilin’s advisor, military expert Yan Gagin called Soledar a "key to the liberation of Donbass" in an interview for TASS, adding that control over the city is a strategic victory for Russian forces. According to Gagin, about 500 Ukrainian servicemen, who could possibly have been "left there unintentionally," may remain in the city.
One tank company for Ukraine not to break situation on battlefield — official
The shipment of a company of Leopard tanks to Ukraine from Poland will not fundamentally break the situation at the contact line, this is merely a virtual success by Kiev, says Alexander Malkevich, member of the Russian Civic Chamber and head of the Department of Journalism and Media Communication at the Kherson State University.
According to Malkevich, the promise to ship the tanks has become a "so necessary, vital ‘victory’ for Kiev now that Soledar is lost. However, he believes that this is merely a virtual victory for Ukrainian authorities.
"Yes, these are heavy armored vehicles. But, first, a company of tanks will not change the situation significantly. Second, one must first understand who will use them and where, and if they are not going to be late with all this at all," Malkevich told TASS.
Meanwhile, Adrien Bocquet, an invited expert on NATO weapons at the DPR mission to the Joint Coordination and Control Center (JCCC) on Ukrainian war crimes, not that using tanks amid the Donbass winter will require serious efforts and will be costly.
"The weight is wrong; they will have problems because of that. The engine requires special liquids for cold weather, special spark plugs in order to run. A very big number of parts must be replaced so that the tanks do not break because of cold. It will be very costly," Bocquet said.
Meanwhile, Adrien Bocquet, an invited expert on NATO weapons at the DPR mission to the Joint Coordination and Control Center (JCCC) on Ukrainian war crimes, not that using tanks amid the Donbass winter will require serious efforts and will be costly.
"The weight is wrong; they will have problems because of that. The engine requires special liquids for cold weather, special spark plugs in order to run. A very big number of parts must be replaced so that the tanks do not break because of cold. It will be very costly," Bocquet said.
Malkevich also pointed out that the Leopards are analogs of Soviet T-72 and T-80 tanks, but it is unclear how Ukraine will pay for them.
"What will they provide in exchange? Is it a preparation for gradual surrender of Western Ukraine, after all? There is a feeling that the next step will be the appearance of a Polish ‘peacekeeping contingent’ in Lvov ‘for protection of strategically important facilities’," he added.
Earlier, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said during a press conference in Lvov that Western states should hand over more tanks to Ukraine. Later, his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda announced the plan to ship a company of German-made Leopard tanks to Ukraine as a part of the international support.
Special operation, January 11th. The main thing:
The Russian Ministry of Defense reported that on January 11, Shoigu made new appointments to lead the special operation. Chief of the General Staff Gerasimov was appointed commander of the Joint Group of Forces, General Surovikin, Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces General Salyukov and Deputy Chief of the General Staff Colonel-General Kim became his deputies.
▪️ Prigozhin announced the complete release of Soledar. According to him, civilians were withdrawn, 500 Ukrainian soldiers who did not want to surrender were killed.
▪️ Pushilin, against the backdrop of military successes, announced a turning point in the liberation of the territory of the DPR.
▪️ The Russian Armed Forces hit the command and observation post of the Ukrainian battalion in Artemovsk, the Ministry of Defense reported.
▪️ Moskalkova said that she met with the Ombudsman of Ukraine Lubinets, they discussed the exchange of wounded prisoners of war and the provision of humanitarian assistance.
▪️ Foreign Policy reported that Turkey has been supplying Ukraine with US-style cluster munitions since November 2022, a RIA Novosti source in the Erdogan administration said that this is misinformation that undermines peace efforts.
The President of the Philippines has been ignoring Zelensky's attempts to contact him since June, Chargé d'Affaires of the Ukrainian Embassy in the country said.
▪️ Poland, within the framework of the international coalition, will transfer a company of Leopard tanks to Ukraine, Duda said.
▪️ The British government has confirmed that London plans to transfer tanks to Kyiv.
▪️ Stoltenberg announced the importance of strengthening NATO military assistance to Ukraine against the backdrop of the events near Artemivsk and Soledar.
▪️ The head of the IAEA said that the conclusion of an agreement on the Zaporozhye NPP is not impossible, since a nuclear incident is not in the interests of either the Russian Federation or Ukraine.
Extra 200 bln rubles ($3 bln) of non-oil and gas revenues of Russia enable the country to solve required issues, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday at the first meeting with Cabinet members in this year.
"We know additional budget revenues, associated exactly with non-oil and gas revenues and not with oil or with gas ones, [stand] at 200 bln rubles provisionally. This provides us with an opportunity to solve all tasks we set for development and for matters being current yet very serious and important," the head of state said.
Sovereign development should be achieved contrary to any pressure from the outside, the Russian leader said. "We certainly need to achieve [resolution] of issues related exactly to sovereign, independent development in the near future, contrary to any external pressure and threats," Putin added.
Chances of India joining price cap on Russian oil ‘nil', says country’s expert
The possibility of India joining the price cap on Russian oil is almost zero as New Delhi relies on its own political and economic interests, an Indian political analyst and Distinguished Fellow at Observer Research Foundation Nandan Unnikrishnan told TASS on Wednesday, adding that the country is not facing secondary EU sanctions for such a decision.
"At the moment the chances of India joining the price cap on oil are virtually nil. India will rely purely on its interests, economic, political, strategic. Currently there is an interest in imports of cheap oil from Russia, which India will not reject. India receives huge revenues," the expert said.
The country is not facing the threat of secondary sanctions from the European Union for purchasing Russian oil, he noted. "The Europeans have become ‘an appendage’ of the Americans as of today, whereas the Americans are not going to impose any sanctions against India as they are being very polite with the Indians, being reluctant to offend them," Nandan Unnikrishnan said.
As much as 85% of the Indian economy is in the private sector, he said. "Indian companies will adhere purely to their business interests," the political analyst said, adding that Reliance industries is the largest purchaser of Russian oil in India, which has serious assets in the US, though it has not stopped imports from Russia.
The world’s third-biggest importer of crude oil after China and the US, India is actively buying Russian oil. In early 2022, Russia’s share in the country’s oil import basket equaled 0.2%, but rose to over 20%, or almost 1 mln barrels per day, by the end of the year.
Putin: Everything Must Be Done to Protect Rights, Security of New Russian Regions' Residents
It is important to do everything possible to protect the constitutional rights and security of new Russian regions' residents, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.
In his congratulations to prosecutor's office employees on their professional holiday, Putin said countering extremism and corruption, protecting the rights of entrepreneurs and environmental protection remain the key areas of work.
"And, of course, it is important to assist the complex, comprehensive work to integrate new regions of Russia into the country's unified legal framework, to do everything to protect constitutional rights and security of people living here," he said.
Referendums on the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR), the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions becoming part of Russia were held on September 23-27, 2022. Most voters supported joining Russia. Putin signed relevant treaties with the territories' heads on September 30.
The Russian president added that Russia's prosecutor's office should pay special attention to the rights of the military personnel, the mobilized soldiers and volunteers participating in the ongoing special military operation.
"It is to pay special attention to respecting the rights of soldiers, mobilized ones, and volunteers. I would like to emphasize that prosecutors have all the necessary powers to effectively address these and other important tasks. I am sure you will do your best to do so," the Russian president said in his congratulatory speech to prosecutors on their professional holiday.
"I specifically draw attention to the need to strengthen oversight of the timely implementation of the state defense orders."
Putin further noted that the main aspect in the work of prosecutors is for Russians to feel that they are under the protection of the law.
Russian prosecutors celebrate their professional holiday on Thursday, January 12.
Smoke rising after shelling in Soledar, in the Donetsk region of Ukraine, on Sunday
The Russian Defense Ministry has announced that Sergey Shoigu made new appointments on January 11 to lead the special military operation to "de-Nazify" and "demilitarize" Ukraine.
Gen.Valery Gerasimov, who had served as Russia’s chief of general staff for over a decade, replaces Gen. Sergei Surovikin as the head of the Russian military in Ukraine, the Defense Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday. General Surovikin is now one of General Gerasimov’s three deputies, according to the statement.
Valery Gerasimov, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, has been appointed Commander of the Russian Joint Group of Forces as part of a special military operation in Ukraine, the Russian Defense Ministry announced on Wednesday.
The Defense Ministry added that Commander of the Aerospace Forces General Sergey Surovikin, Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Ground Forces Oleg Salyukov and Deputy Chief of the General Staff Colonel General Alexei Kim have been named Gerasimov's deputies.
The new appointments in the leadership of the special military operation are connected with the expansion of the scale of the tasks being solved and the need for closer interaction between all types and branches of the military, the MoD explained.
General Surovikin was only put in charge of the Russian forces in Ukraine in October, ending months of disjointed military structure that analysts said contributed to Russia’s disastrous battlefield performance. His appointment came after the Ukrainians mounted a successful counteroffensive that drove the Russians out of much of the Kharkiv region.
General Surovikin was able to conduct an orderly retreat from the southern city of Kherson, the only Ukrainian provincial capital captured by Russian forces in nearly a year since the invasion. But he had struggled to make significant progress in the grinding offensive in the east of the country.
Gerasimov replaced General Surovikin, who was appointed as the commander of the Russian Joint Group of Forces in the zone of the special military operation on October 8, 2022. In late December, Russian President Vladimir Putin presented the Order of St. George award to Surovikin for his courage, bravery and dedication.
Gerasimov has been serving as the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces and First Deputy Defense Minister since November 2012, when he replaced Nikolay Makarov.
On February 24, 2022, Russia kicked off a special military operation with a stated goal to "demilitarize" and "de-Nazify" Ukraine. The operation was launched just two days after Russia recognized the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics as independent and sovereign nations and received a request for military assistance, after weeks of escalating shelling, sabotage, and sniper attacks by Ukrainian forces against the breakaway republics, and fears that Kiev would launch an all-out offensive.
In March 2022, the Russian Defense Ministry released documents which exposed Ukraine's imminent plans to launch an offensive against Donbass.
Intense fighting continued in the eastern Ukrainian town of Soledar on Wednesday, despite a claim by the founder of a mercenary force leading Russia’s offensive there that his troops had seized control of the town.
A Wednesday morning update from Ukraine’s General Staff of the Army gave no indication that the battle for the salt-mining town of Soledar had ended. And Russia’s defense ministry and the Kremlin did not confirm the claim by the mercenaries, the Wagner Group, that Soledar had fallen, saying that the town was only blocked for now.In the ministry’s daily briefing on Wednesday, it said that its paratroopers “had blocked Soledar from the north and south” and that its assault units were “fighting in the city.”
Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, urged reporters to wait for official announcements about whether the city had been captured, adding that “tactical successes are certainly very important as they come at a rather expensive price.”
The assault is part of Russia’s broader push in the area around the city of Bakhmut that Moscow sees as important to achieving its goal of occupying all of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.
In and around Bakhmut, the Wagner Group, which has recruited prisoners into its ranks, has become the main force there, and the fighting has been brutal.The entrepreneur who started the Wagner Group, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, is a longtime ally of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia but has also been publicly critical of Russia’s Defense Ministry and increasingly outspoken after acknowledging in September that he was the founder of the shadowy organization.
The group’s fighters have also been deployed in support of the Kremlin’s military campaigns in Africa and the Middle East.
Even as the Kremlin expressed caution, Russia’s Channel One — one of the two main state-run television networks — trumpeted in its news report on Wednesday that Russian forces had achieved “a strategically important victory in the Donbas,” saying that “Soledar is under control.”
The report, which did not mention the Wagner Group, said that Russian forces had pushed through a “labyrinth of underground strongholds” to capture Soledar.
Mr. Prigozhin maintained in a post on Telegram that his troops had control of all of Soledar, though he added that fighting was continuing.
“A cauldron has been formed in the center of the city, in which urban battles are being fought,” he said.
How a small salt-mining town with a prewar population of 10,000 became a focus of such a sustained assault by Wagner’s forces has been an open question. The most critical factor is perhaps what Mr. Prigozhin and his mercenaries fighting there have to gain in terms of reputation.
New generation high-precision munitions demolish Ukrainian Armed Forces strongholds and armor (video courtesy of Russian MoD)
A precision-guided munition successfully engaged a stronghold and an armored vehicle of the Ukrainian Armed Forces located a significant distance away. The targets were hit with the first shot.
"It has been a remarkable transformation. Nearly a year since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the head of Russia’s largest mercenary group, who had long denied ties to the military, has become in some ways the public face of Moscow’s war effort.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the Wagner private military company, has come to exemplify Kremlin outsiders who are challenging Russia’s traditional elites, underlining how Moscow’s setbacks in Ukraine have been changing the country’s power structure, analysts say.In recent months, Mr. Prigozhin has tried to position himself as the Kremlin’s indispensable military leader, even as he has stepped up his criticism of the Russian Defense Ministry.
He has boosted Russia’s decimated fighting ranks with tens of thousands of prisoner recruits to his mercenary force, awarded medals, visited military cemeteries and, according to his frequent videos, appeared unexpectedly at the toughest sections of the front line.
This week Mr. Prigozhin portrayed himself as the mastermind of what he presented as Russia’s biggest military success in months: a breakthrough in the eastern Ukrainian town of Soledar.
Standing in full battle gear, Mr. Prigozhin appeared surrounded by his fighters in what he claimed were the salt mines beneath Soledar, according to photos released by Russian state news agencies and Wagner-affiliated social media on Tuesday night. Mr. Prigozhin claimed the city was fully under his control and took full credit for the apparent success.
“No other forces apart from PMC Wagner fighters have participated in the assault on Soledar,” Mr. Prigozhin said in an audio message published on the Telegram messaging app, using a Russian acronym for private military companies.
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that its regular units were “fighting in the city,” and Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, said that the capture of Soledar would be an important, but costly, tactical success, rather than a turning point.
It was just the latest sign of tensions between Wagner and the Russian Armed Forces, which analysts say show that there is a struggle for President Vladimir V. Putin’s favor as the military outlook in Ukraine darkens.
In late December, Wagner fighters released a profanity-laden video addressed to the military high command, where they accused it of withholding ammunition and causing the deaths of their comrades.
Mr. Prigozhin responded to the video by saying “when you’re sitting in a warm office, the frontline problems are hard to hear,” in apparent reference to the generals.
And last week, a prominent Telegram news channel affiliated with Mr. Prigozhin, called Grey Zone, discredited the Defense Ministry’s claim that it had killed 600 Ukrainian servicemen in an aerial strike, by publishing photos of an intact building that was supposedly destroyed.
Mr. Prigozhin’s attempts to take credit for the victory in Soledar show his growing political ambition and underline how Kremlin outsiders are challenging Mr. Putin’s traditional circle in the aftermath of Ukraine setbacks, said Abbas Gallyamov, the president’s former speechwriter, who has broken ties with him.
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Wednesday urged Russian government officials to work hard to improve living conditions in the regions of Ukraine that Moscow has illegally annexed and where conditions are frequently dire, acknowledging that the situation in the regions has been “difficult.”
Speaking at his first meeting with government ministers this year, Mr. Putin said that “the fighting continues in some areas, peaceful life has not been restored everywhere and people’s safety hasn’t been ensured.”
“It is already necessary to set specific goals and gradually achieve them step by step,” he said, in remarks published by the Kremlin.The comments came as Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed to have blocked Soledar, an eastern Ukrainian salt-mine town. If captured, Soledar would represent the first major Russian military success since July, although much of it is in ruins — like other cities that were centers of fierce fighting.
Russia’s Defense Ministry has been building several new apartment blocks in Mariupol, which Moscow took in the spring after months of devastating the city, cutting it off from adequate food and water. Some cities — such as Sievierodonetsk, which Russia captured in June — have turned into ghost towns, according to video reports, with people living in charred apartment blocks, sometimes in basements, without heat and running water.
Mr. Putin told his ministers to ensure that by 2030 the annexed regions reach the average Russian levels of infrastructure development, social services and quality of life.
Strained by the need to finance its war machine, the Russian government said on Tuesday that it had posted a $47 billion budget deficit in 2022, which is the second-highest since the break up of the Soviet Union.
The budget gap reached 3.3 trillion rubles in 2022, or 2.3 percent of the size of the Russian economy, Anton Siluanov, the country’s finance minister, said during a government meeting .Russia’s revenues increased by 2.8 trillion rubles in 2022, or $40 billion, but that was not enough to cover rapidly increasing expenditures, which skyrocketed by 6.4 trillion rubles, or $92 billion, officials said.
At the meeting, government officials presented the economic situation as positive, with Mikhail Mishustin, the Russian prime minister, saying that “overall, those indicators aren’t bad.”
Making no specific reference to the war, Mr. Silanov, the finance minister, said: “Despite the geopolitical situation, the restrictions and sanctions, we have fulfilled all our planned goals.”
Still, the posted deficit for 2022 is second only in Russia’s post-Soviet history to the one reported for 2020, the year the coronavirus pandemic unfolded.
In the immediate aftermath of Russia’s Military Operation of Ukraine, many experts predicted a catastrophic collapse of the country’s economy from the Western sanctions and other restrictive measures.
Yet the Russian economy performed above expectations, buoyed by high commodity prices. And some sanctions, like a cap of $60 per barrel on the price for Russian oil, were introduced later in the year, softening their effect on the economy.The Russian government has not published a detailed breakdown of its expenditures in 2022, but it is widely assumed that the bulk of the rise can be attributed to increased military spending.
The government has financed the deficit by issuing bonds and using money from its rainy-day fund. A high deficit is likely for this year, too. Russia plans to increase its military spending by a third, and Moscow’s oil revenues are expected to be pressured by the oil price cap, which compels Russian traders to sell crude at a discount.
Britain is weighing whether to send a small number of tanks to Ukraine, a move that would reverse the West’s nearly yearlong resistance to deploying some of its mightiest firepower against Russia.
No decision has yet been made on whether the Challenger II tanks — reportedly as few as 10 — will be donated to Ukraine. But such a move is being considered, an official spokesman for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak told reporters at a Downing Street briefing on Tuesday.
Mr. Sunak had spoken with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine a week earlier “about what would be most effective in helping Ukraine,” said the spokesman, who is not normally identified by name under the rules for the briefing.
Kyiv has demanded Western tanks almost since the start of the war to supplement the Soviet-era and Russian-made tanks that were in Ukraine’s stockpiles or supplied by other countries in Eastern Europe. Those tanks are not compatible with the size of ammunition that is used in most NATO states, leaving Ukraine constantly on the hunt for more munitions.
The Challenger II would be the first Western-made main battle tank to be sent to Ukraine since Russia invaded last February. Defense officials in the United States and Europe have long worried that sending tanks would signal more direct involvement in the fighting and could prompt President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia into escalating the conflict. The internal British discussions were reported earlier by Sky News.
The move follows pledges by other Western powers to give Kyiv heavy armored fighting vehicles. The country’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, over the weekend welcomed such pledges as a sign that “the time of weapons taboo has passed.”
Last week, France said it would deliver an unspecified but limited number of French AMX-10 reconnaissance vehicles. That announcement was quickly followed by a decision by the United States to send Ukraine 50 M2 Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and by Germany, which pledged 40 Marder Infantry Fighting Vehicles.
The Ukrainian ambassador to London said in an interview on Tuesday that the number of tanks that Britain was considering fell far short of what was needed. “A dozen tanks is not enough — we need hundreds,” the Ukrainian ambassador, Vadym Prystaiko, said in an interview with a British news show, LBC’s “Tonight with Andrew Marr.”
Still, sending Challenger IIs could ratchet up pressure on Germany to commit to sending its Leopard II tanks to Ukraine, as Kyiv wants. Chancellor Olaf Scholz has maintained that Berlin would not be the first NATO ally to send such equipment into the war.On Tuesday, Mr. Kuleba met with Germany’s foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, as she visited eastern Kharkiv, and urged Germany to send Leopards. “The longer it takes to make the decision, the more people will die,” he said at their joint news conference, according to news reports.
“The sooner this decision is made, the sooner this war will end with Ukraine’s victory and there will be no more war in Europe.”
Ben Barry, a land warfare expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, said Britain has about 227 Challenger II tanks on hand, and ammunition and spare parts are limited.
By comparison, there are several thousand German-made Leopards used by national militaries across Europe, Mr. Barry said, but Berlin must give its approval before they can be donated to Ukraine. He said Ukraine is seeking an additional 300 battle tanks.“Ukraine has said that it wants to mount significant offensive operations this coming year, in order to push the Russians back — ideally to push them out,” Mr. Barry said. “And it’s said to do that, it needs extra Western armor
Joe Biden has been accused of hypocrisy for condemning his Republican predecessor Donald Trump for keeping official documents after leaving the White House in 2020 that he had the authority to declassify.
The House Oversight Committee has launched its own probe into the discovery of classified official documents at a private office used by President Joe Biden.
Republican Kentucky Representative James Comer, who is the new chair of the panel, wrote to White House counsel Stuart Delery on Tuesday, asking him to provide all the documents found at Biden's private office in Pennsylvania by January 23.
"The Committee is concerned that President Biden has compromised sources and methods with his own mishandling of classified documents," Comer wrote.
The congressman also wrote to National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) acting archivist Debra Steidel Wall to ask for copies of the same documents.
Comer told Wall that the delay in reporting the the discovery of the papers at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement by Biden's own lawyers, more than two months earlier on November 2, 2022, "raises questions about political bias at the agency."
US TV news media reported on Monday that around 10 classified documents had been discovered by Biden's own lawyers at the center, part of the University of Pennsylvania, which Biden used as a personal office from 2017 to 2020.
"The White House is cooperating with the National Archives and the Department of Justice regarding the discovery of what appear to be Obama-Biden Administration records, including a small number of documents with classified markings," Biden's special legal counsel Richard Sauber said on Monday.
Comer has been a thorn in Biden's side before, launching a Republican-led probe into the Biden family's alleged international network of corruption in November last year.
Attorney General Merrick Garland, who is currently accompanying Biden on his trip to a regional summit in Mexico, has ordered a Department of Justice "review" of the documents.
Garland also ordered last August's FBI raid on Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home in Florida to seize documents which the former president took with him on leaving the White House in January 2020. The agents denied Trump's lawyers access to the villa and reportedly rifled through his wife Melania's underwear.
The classified papers found at Biden's private office reportedly include intelligence files on Ukraine, Iran and even NATO ally, the UK.
While serving as vice-president to Barack Obama, Biden pressured the Kiev government to sack its prosecutor general Viktor Shokin after he launched a probe into gas company Burisma Holdings, which employed Biden's son Hunter as an executive despite his lack of any qualifications. Democrats attempted to impeach Trump for asking Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate possible corruption by the Bidens.
The Biden administration has also broken his election promise to return the US to the JCPOA agreement with Iran on the use of peaceful nuclear energy, assuring Iranian emigres there would be no deal while talks were still underway in the Austrian capital Vienna.
And the president has tried to pressure the UK to surrender in its dispute with the European Union over the Northern Ireland Protocol to the UK withdrawal agreement from the bloc, claiming to have a stake in the deal due to his supposed Irish ancestry.
