Embargoes and Sanctions

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      North Korean Missiles Rain Down on Ukraine Despite Sanctions

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      Russia has received new shipments of Hwasong-11 short-range ballistic missiles, according to a new report.North Korea has continued to supply advanced short-range ballistic missiles to Russia in defiance of sanctions meant to prevent Pyongyang from developing such weapons and Moscow from importing them, according to a report by a weapons research group.Remnants of four of the missiles, which are called Hwasong-11, were examined in Kyiv on Sept. 3 by investigators from Conflict Armament Research, an independent group based in Britain that identifies and tracks weapons and ammunition used in wars around the world.That team decoded production markings on several parts from each missile collected by Ukrainian authorities.A Hwasong-11 missile used in an Aug. 18 attack on Kyiv had markings showing that it was made this year. Internal parts from three others, which were used in attacks in July and August, lacked markings that would indicate when they were manufactured.The researchers released those findings in a report on Wednesday.In early January, the White House accused North Korea of providing ballistic missiles to Russia, but subsequent shipments had not been previously reported.The Hwasong-11 missile has a range of about 430 miles and can be fitted with nuclear or conventional warheads, according to a U.S. Army report. It is visually similar to the Russian Iskander short-range ballistic missile and may have been made with foreign assistance, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Iran Sent Short-Range Missiles to Russia, U.S. and European Officials Say

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      U.S. and European countries had warned of sanctions if Iran provided weapons that could be used against Ukraine. President Biden’s lame-duck status could hamper a response.Iran has sent short-range ballistic missiles to Russia, according to U.S. and European officials, despite sharp warnings from Washington and its allies not to provide those precise armaments to Moscow to use against targets in Ukraine.The new missiles are expected to help Russia further its efforts to destroy Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure, which President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said this week now involved 4,000 bombs a month across the country.The U.S. and European officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, confirmed that after months of warnings about sanctions, Iran has shipped several hundred short-range ballistic missiles to Russia. The delivery was reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal.Iran denied providing the weapons in a statement released on Friday by its permanent mission to the United Nations and said its position on the war in Ukraine was unchanged.“Iran considers the provision of military assistance to the parties engaged in the conflict — which leads to increased human casualties, destruction of infrastructure, and a distancing from cease-fire negotiations — to be inhumane,” the statement said. “Thus, not only does Iran abstain from engaging in such actions itself, but it also calls upon other countries to cease the supply of weapons to the sides involved in the conflict.”The Group of 7 nations warned in March that they would impose coordinated sanctions on Iran if it carried out the missile transfer, a warning that was repeated at a NATO summit meeting in Washington in July. On Friday, a spokesman for the National Security Council said that the United States was “alarmed” by reports of a missile transfer and was prepared to respond with “significant consequences.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Seized an Airplane Owned by Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro

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      The Biden administration said the airplane had been illegally exported for Mr. Maduro. U.S. officials accuse him of undermining the results of a presidential election he lost.The U.S. government has seized an airplane linked to Nicolás Maduro, the leader of Venezuela, and brought it to Florida on Monday because it was bought in violation of U.S. sanctions, according to a Justice Department statement.The Biden administration is trying to put more pressure on Mr. Maduro because of his attempts to undermine the results of the recent presidential election in his country, White House officials said.The Justice Department said in its statement that it had seized a Dassault Falcon 900EX owned and operated by Mr. Maduro and his partners after it had been brought to the Dominican Republic for maintenance work. The department then had the plane flown to Florida. The plane had been purchased in the United States for $13 million through a shell company and “smuggled” out of the country “for use by Nicolás Maduro and his cronies,” Merrick B. Garland, the U.S. attorney general, said in the statement.The Homeland Security Department helped the Justice Department lead the operation, one U.S. official said. The Commerce Department was involved as well.“Let this seizure send a clear message: Aircraft illegally acquired from the United States for the benefit of sanctioned Venezuelan officials cannot just fly off into the sunset,” Matthew S. Axelrod, the assistant secretary for export enforcement at the Commerce Department, said in a written statement.Video footage broadcast by CNN on Monday showed the airplane, a sleek white jet with red stripes, sitting on a tarmac in Florida.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Elecciones en Venezuela: mandatarios del mundo exigen más transparencia a Maduro

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      Los manifestantes salieron a las calles de Caracas cuando Nicolás Maduro se proclamó vencedor, mientras que la oposición señaló que el recuento de votos mostraba que su candidato había ganado.[Estamos en WhatsApp. Empieza a seguirnos ahora]Las protestas estallaron el lunes en Caracas, la capital de Venezuela. Cientos de jóvenes marcharon por las calles indignados por los resultados de unas elecciones presidenciales en las que el presidente en funciones, Nicolás Maduro, se declaró ganador a pesar de las acusaciones generalizadas de fraude y proclamó de manera oficial que las elecciones estaban decididas sin hacer público el recuento completo de votos.Estados Unidos y países de todo el mundo denunciaron los resultados oficiales de la votación del domingo, que no parecían coincidir con las proyecciones estadísticas sustentados en recuentos parciales y otros datos que mostraban que el presidente perdía por un margen amplio.El lunes por la tarde, el gobierno venezolano anunció que había expulsado a las misiones diplomáticas de siete países latinoamericanos que habían condenado los resultados electorales oficiales.La líder de la oposición, María Corina Machado, anunció el lunes por la noche que su movimiento había recibido las actas del 73 por ciento de las mesas electorales del país y refutó las afirmaciones del gobierno. Estos resultados apuntaban a que el oponente de Maduro, Edmundo González, había recibido 3,5 millones de votos más que el presidente.González calificó el margen de “matemáticamente irreversible”.La decisión de la autoridad electoral de declarar la victoria pero no hacer públicos los resultados detallados de la votación, como había hecho habitualmente en elecciones anteriores, intensificó la sensación entre muchos venezolanos y observadores internacionales de que las elecciones habían sido, en efecto, robadas.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Fencing Feud Highlights Ukrainian-Russian Animosity at Olympics

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      The war has torn apart old alliances and heightened the acrimony. A Ukrainian fencer is competing after her refusal to shake hands with a Russian rival got her barred from the world championships.Olha Kharlan of Ukraine shouted in celebration under the vaulted glass dome of the Grand Palais on Monday, after an early round victory in her pursuit of a fifth career Olympic medal in saber fencing.She had reached the semifinals by late afternoon. But just her mere presence confirmed that this niche sport, perhaps more than any other, illustrates the acrimony and caustic feuding that have resulted from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Kharlan, 33, was disqualified from the world fencing championships last summer for refusing to shake hands with her Russian opponent. But Thomas Bach, the president of the International Olympic Committee and himself a 1976 Olympic fencing champion, gave Kharlan an exemption to participate in the Paris Games, citing her “unique situation.”There she was on Monday, competing in the Olympics, while Russia was absent from the biggest international event in fencing, a sport in which it has long been a power athletically and administratively.Ohla Kharlan, right, competing against Shihomi Fukushima of Japan in the Grand Palais on Monday.Andrew Medichini/Associated PressWith Russia banned from these Games because of its invasion, only 15 of its athletes are competing in Paris, all designated as neutral, without the accompaniment of the country’s flag or national anthem. There are none in fencing, a huge blow to the country’s Olympic prestige given that Russia and the former Soviet Union rank behind only Italy, France and Hungary in fencing’s overall medal count.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Wayne S. Smith, a Leading Critic of the Embargo on Cuba, Dies at 91

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      A former State Department official, he resigned in protest in 1982 over Cuba policy, then spent decades trying to rebuild relations with the island nation.Wayne S. Smith, a veteran Cuba expert at the State Department who, after resigning in protest over America’s embargo against the island nation in 1982, spent nearly four decades leading efforts to rebuild relations between Washington and Havana, died on June 28 at his home in New Orleans. He was 91.His daughter, Melinda Smith Ulloa, said the cause was complications of Alzheimer’s disease.For more than 24 years after he joined the Foreign Service in 1958, Mr. Smith was America’s man in Havana, whether he was physically in the Cuban capital or dealing with it from a desk in Washington.Later, after leaving the State Department, he used his extensive experience to carry out a sustained campaign against America’s strategy of isolating Cuba, while also leading private and congressional delegations to the island in an attempt to build avenues of dialogue.“He was one of the foremost spokespeople in favor of normalizing relations,” William LeoGrande, an expert on Cuba affairs at American University in Washington, said in an interview.A witty and nimble writer, Mr. Smith turned out scores of opinion pieces, journal essays and books, including a memoir-cum-history, “The Closest of Enemies: A Personal and Diplomatic Account of U.S.-Cuban Relations Since 1957,” published in 1987.“Cuba seems to have the same effect on U.S. administrations,” he liked to say, “as the full moon once had on werewolves.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Segunda vuelta electoral en Irán: quiénes son los candidatos y qué proponen

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      El balotaje ocurre después de una votación especial celebrada tras la muerte del presidente Ebrahim Raisi ocurrida en un accidente de helicóptero en mayo.[Estamos en WhatsApp. Empieza a seguirnos ahora]El viernes se enfrentarán dos candidatos, un reformista y un ultraconservador, en la segunda vuelta de las elecciones presidenciales de Irán, tras una primera vuelta con la asistencia de votantes más baja en la historia del país y en medio de una atmósfera de apatía generalizada ante la posibilidad de que pueda lograrse un cambio significativo mediante el sufragio.La segunda vuelta electoral ocurre después de una votación especial celebrada tras la muerte del presidente Ebrahim Raisi ocurrida en un accidente de helicóptero en mayo.¿Qué sucedió en la primera vuelta de las elecciones de Irán?Alrededor del 40 por ciento de los votantes, un récord de baja participación, acudió a las urnas el pasado viernes, y ninguno de los cuatro candidatos incluidos en la boleta reunió el 50 por ciento de los votos que se necesitan para ganar las elecciones.El candidato reformista, Masoud Pezeshkian, exministro de Salud, y Saíd Yalilí, un exnegociador en temas nucleares y ultraconservador de línea dura, recibieron más votos que los demás, por lo que participarán en la segunda vuelta electoral que se celebrará el 5 de julio.Pezeshkian avanzó gracias a que el voto conservador se dividió entre dos candidatos y uno de ellos recibió menos del uno por ciento.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Iran’s Runoff Election: What to Know

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      Two candidates from opposite camps will compete for the presidency after no one garnered the number of votes needed last week to win.Two candidates, a reformist and an ultraconservative, will face off in Iran’s runoff presidential election on Friday, amid record-low voter turnout and overarching apathy that meaningful change could happen through the ballot box.The runoff election follows a special vote held after President Ebrahim Raisi’s death in a helicopter crash in May.What happened in Iran’s first-round vote?About 40 percent of voters, a record low, went to the polls last Friday, and none of the four candidates on the ballot garnered the 50 percent of votes needed to win the election.The reformist candidate, Dr. Masoud Pezeshkian, a former health minister, and Saeed Jalili, an ultra-hard-liner and former nuclear negotiator, received the most votes, sending the election into a runoff round on Friday.Dr. Pezeshkian advanced because the conservative vote was split between two candidates, with one receiving fewer than 1 percent.The runoff may have a slightly larger turnout. Some Iranians said on social media that they feared Mr. Jalili’s hard-line policies and would vote for Dr. Pezeshkian. Polls show that about half of the votes for Mr. Jalili’s conservative rival in the first round, Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, have been redirected to Dr. Pezeshkian.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More