allowing continued dependency on russian gas. i mean, melinda, what, what do you make of michael's comments just there? well, she's certainly not alone with those comments. she has joined a broad chorus of voices from all across the political spectrum here in germany. we also heard the remarks by the president of frank vault to shine my a little bit earlier with a very similar take saying, you know, breach of international law, territorial integrity and so on. both of them illustrate the ambivalence of german policy. these of the russia over really over decades. the ambivalence on the one hand is that from fall to shine meyer, as you mentioned, stood on the my down that central square in key of when there were massive demonstrations against the countries pro russian backed president in 2014 and attempted to moderate between the demonstrators and the president and thereby prevented further bloodshed. he was later accused by vladimir putin of helping fo

meant a qu, namely, bringing in to power a government, an independent government, not backed by russia. he did not push back on that he did not contradict, put in, in fact, he said there's no sense in confrontation. he also, in 2016, issued a warning not to russia, but to nato, saying that nato should stop rattling it sabres. that's just one example of ambivalence uncle michael. not only did she try to keep dialogue open, as you mentioned, but she also spearheaded the european effort to impose sanctions and kept her fellow e u. member states on line with sanctions through a whole different, you know, through multiple stages of sanctions in response to different acts of voting, putting and at the same time she was a firm adherent of the belief in change through commercial relations. essentially the idea that by maintaining good trade ties with the country, you can insure a degree of moderation and stability. and this really goes back

a long way in germany, partly to the lessons that it learned in world war 2. some would say learned to, well, the idea that germany should never again resort to force that military power is somehow taboo and off limits for germany. and diplomacy is everything. germany is not always acted by that credo. in fact, in the cold war, it stepped right up with deterrence when it allowed pershing missiles to be stationed here, and thereby helped to bring russia to its knees. but unfortunately, this idea of commercial relations being the trump has continued until now. and i think what we're seeing is a major paradigm shift for german policy makers. and it will have enormous repercussions in terms of defense expenditure and far more, including relations with china, potential turning point in history. melinda crane, thanks so much for that context. a pleasure, as always, to have you in the studio. and if you're just joining us,

here's an update on the latest developments. russia rambling on recently. now in a 2nd day, friends in his forces are battling russian troops on the edge of the capital give. and that there have been reports of a gun fired near the government district. those air rides, air, raid sirens that you just heard, have been sounding in care of. and in other cities, was prompted people to take shelter in metro stations. and apartment building was partially destroyed, overnights and ukraine's, that it shot down to russian missiles and a fighter jet over the capitol. the ukrainian government says at least 137 people have died since evasion began and hundreds more have been in church. we're going to get to the latest business news related to this invasion and then hand over to my colleague robots. ah, welcome to this update on the latest business related news regarding russia's invasion of ukraine. we begin in brussels,

where you leaders have agreed on further sanctions against russia. following the emergency summit, you are being commission president. ursula, on the line said the blocks, 2nd rafters, sanctions in a week would have maximum impact on the russian economy. political elite is she forwarded. the measures aim to target 70 percent of russia's banking market, as well as key stay, turn companies. it adds to further sanctions imposed by the united states as well. the latest sanctions against russia include in terms of the financial sector, the u. s is putting restrictions against all major russian banks. meanwhile, the u is also cutting the ability of the russian state to access the blocks capital markets, their asset freezes, and travel bands for a number of individuals, including politicians and oligarchy, with close ties to putin. there are further sanctions against the russian energy sector. after putting the north stream to pipeline on hold, you is threatening to curb exports and imports for gas giant gas from other

sanctions target the technology sector as well. the will stop supply high tech components and software to russia, and the u. s. says it was severely restrict which has access to semiconductors, computers and telecoms equipment still on the table. so is disconnecting russia from the international payment system. swift. but that would come with severe problems to western countries too. and so far hasn't been agreed upon where we can now speak to veronica grim from the german council of economic experts. thanks a lot for joining us. let's talk a bit more about the latest you sanctions, what impact they actually going to have on russia. and so meanwhile, the youth summit meet on the package that has been prepared for weeks. so excess of major ration banks to you, your p capital market will be blocked. assets of certain russians in europe will be frozen and good for the energy industry. you may no longer be delivered to russia

and some other things. and so the fact that the sanctions were passed without much come from the sea can be seen as a sign of particularly good preparation are also inadequate preparation because after all, in the massive in ways and maybe tougher sanctions would also been appropriate. and one has not decided to cut out russia from the swift payment system. so this would be quite tougher. and that has not been chosen up to now. yeah. they, they have decided that they're not going to exclude russia from this, into the system that would make it very difficult for russia to trade with other countries. why have they stopped short of fat at this stage? and so it has been said and that that have to be sanctions that would remain in case more c,

r sanctions would be appropriate. however, this situation might have been occurred already today. so the swift sanctions would have the practical effect that cross or the payment would no longer be possible and would also restrict payments within russia. so this would be a sanction actually, and it had been applied before to other countries in the past. for example, iran, north korea dentist example in iran after the 2012 exclusion, half of the exports and the sort of international trade of iran had collapsed. so it had a very big impact on iran, but it is being saved up. like you said, germany is one of the countries that says that it wants to keep this sort of in the armory for use later on. but what sort of a situation would it take for this actually to happen?

and this is very hard to answer for me. so i think the in house being massive up to now and it seems that this is jason has also not been expected in the way it happened before. so i would think that execution of swift would be appropriate as the sanction, but it has not been decided maybe because it has not been prepared sufficiently up to now. right. but there are a member states that are pushing for a poland. for example, latvia, countries that feel a lot more under threat from russia. i want to talk about actually the impact of what's happening in ukraine for ordinary europeans. it's a continent that's already struggling with inflation and energy crunch. are those things that are going to get worse? because of what's happening and you cry you know, the gas prices are currently at

a very high level, and the situation is not expected to ease in the short term, especially if the gas supply from russia is decreasing. now, due to the crisis, it is not clear whether this would happen and at what time this, this could happen. however, wholesale prices will regularly passed on to consumers. the gas prices are very high. the pass on to consumers and is slow because many of them have long term contracts, but for the price increases are to be expected for further process products. for example, the price increases will spread to fertilizer and then also to food. so the inflation is likely to remain high this year, and we should see at least a 4 before the decimal point for 2022. and this makes of course, 2nd round effect the weight price or more likely and put

a lot of pressure at the be in the situation that is very complicated in europe at the moment. ok, ranika graham from a german council of economic experts. thank you so much. for bringing us your insights. thank you. and i'm now joined in the studio by cassandra, some from d, w business. cassandra, we just been hearing about the sanctions that are coming rushes way and could be coming rushes way as must have been preparing for a moment like this. yes, they have part of the problem here is that this was 1st dangled as an option. this idea that russia could be kicked out of the switch banking system back in 2014, when russia annexed crimea. so at the time russia responded in a typically bombastic fashion, saying that kicking it out of the switch system would be the equivalent of an declaration of war. so the time western allies put it on the back burner. that was in 2014 over 7 years ago. russia has had time to build up what many are calling

a fortress economy. they div dollar ised massively 20 years ago. 80 percent of their liabilities were in dollars. now it's less than 50 percent. they built up gold reserves and $643000000000.00 in currency reserved reserves, and they have one of the lowest debt to g d p ratios in the entire world. so these are all results of a careful plan that putin has been, president putin has been putting in place since the annexation of kyra crimea in 2014. but nevertheless, this would have a big impact on how russia could deal with the rest of the world. if it was be kicked out of swift, so i'm mobile, richard, or if it is. yeah. we only have one example really of the u. s. successfully getting a country kicked out of swift. that would be iran. so there's not a lot of historical data to go off of, and we are reading the tea leaves. but there are some fears being floated around that if russia is kicked out, it would undermine the swift system as a whole and encourage the development of alternatives. russia does have its own

system, s p s s, but currently it's really only used by russian banks. china launched its own system in 2015, but that's really still under development. it's called the cross border international payment system and it's only used by about $80.00 foreign banks. but in principle, there's reason it can't be used as a substitute for swift. and believe it or not, there are still some pre swift tools that russia could use russian financial institutions could use like the telephone and telex. and nowadays, you could use email as a secure business bank to bank a secure messaging system. these are all tools at russia's disposal. so while removing russia from the swift system would be cutting it off from a key highway of global finance. there are other back roads that he could use that even if they are a little slower and bumpier. of course, the west would have less control over whatever alternative russia, so it's out. okay, so awesome. thanks for bringing it up today. now

the recent developments in ukraine and especially the sanctions levied against russia have had an impact on markets after steep drops on thursday. stock markets rebounded on friday even as russia pressed its attacks and global can. that condemnation grew. the nikki was 2 percent in europe. the german tax and the foot see in london rose to present in early trading. this global uptake follows a surprise rally on wall street as well. after investors found the latest sanctions to be less harsh than that actually been expected. once more, here are some of the immediate economic fallout from the recent developments in ukraine. chip makers expect only limited supply chain disruptions caused by the russian invasion of ukraine. thanks to stockpiling, however, that could be an impact further down the road. as ukraine supplies more than 90 percent of semiconductor,

great knee on the gas is critical for the lasers used engine. jet engine makers, rolls royce and san fran say they have been ramping up supplies of titanium, much of which is supplied normally by russia. the use of titanium has soared in recent years is playing makers try to make jets lighter. the companies said they're also looking to diversify their sources. and the global airline industry is re evaluating routes and supply lines is ukraine's ass based, closes japan airlines council flights to moscow and britain as close as space to russian airlines, including aero lot industry analysts say carriers should have contingency plans in place in case russia, russian estimates is hit by ah, and that was the deli is rob. what they are. i'm clear, richardson in berlin. welcome back. now russia is ramping up its invasion of

ukraine. now in a 2nd day, ukraine says its forces are battling russian troops on the edge of the capital cave . and there have been reports of gunfire near the government district. ah, ah, air raid sirens have been sounding in t of and in other cities, prompting people to take shelter in metro stations. an apartment building was partially destroyed over night, and ukraine said it's shot down to russian missiles and a fighter jet over the capitol. the ukrainian government says at least 137 people have died since the invasion began, and hundreds more have been injured. we want to take you now to live with pictures of the situation in the ukrainian capital key. if you're looking at an almost deserted might and square it might look like com there. at this landmark in the heart of the city, bought the people that you don't see are seeking cover in shelters and underground in train stations. and there are a.