Brussels has all but abandoned them to their fates, so is it any wonder that Italy, Spain and other European countries have turned to Moscow and Beijing for meaningful support in terms of expert advice and medical supplies? When this coronavirus pandemic has passed and the nations of the European Union are counting the cost of decimated populations, shattered public health infrastructures and [...]

Russia's approach to the spread of Covid-19 has been quite effective, partially because it began taking preventive measures long before the World Health Organization labeled it a pandemic, the WHO’s chief in Moscow has told RT. “Russia started with the measures very early, before the famous ‘pandemic’ word was spelled out by [WHO] Director General Tedros Ghebreyesus on March 11," said Dr [...]

Time to buckle up: economists believe the looming Covid-19 crash will throw millions out of work and bankrupt thousands of businesses across the globe in a downturn that might even surpass the Great Depression of the 1930s. Economics is the study of choices, and never more so than now. It’s now clear that, with the coronavirus pandemic causing widespread chaos that economists believe will cause [...]

Wall Street’s main indices are down after opening on Monday for the first ever all-electronic trading session, which is aimed at protecting New York Stock Exchange employees from the coronavirus. Both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 are down around two percent. The Nasdaq Composite, an index comprised of America’s top technology companies, is down slightly in early tr [...]

New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio believes April will be ‘a lot worse’ than March when it comes to coronavirus, and wants the US military ‘mobilized’ in response to the disease. Speaking on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press,’ De Blasio took a jab at the federal government, claiming he sees very little positive about its response to the spread of coronavirus. [...]

Earlier in the day, Russian military planes transported equipment and around 100 experts to Italy to provide the country with help amid the COVID-19 pandemic. A tenth Il-76 military plane has departed from Russia to Italy to assist in the fight against COVID-19, the Russian Defence Ministry said in a statement. [...]

Most major global economies have already been affected by the outbreak, which has forced many workers to stay in their homes and almost entirely dried up the restaurant and hospitality industries. The US economy is facing the prospect of sustaining a heavier blow from the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak than it suffered from the financial crisis between 2008 and 2009, according to the estimates of e [...]

US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin announced that the Trump administration may send checks to Americans “in the next two weeks” to fight the economic fallout of the COVID-19 novel coronavirus. Though the amount is unknown, an economics expert tells Sputnik that the government has already failed on the matter. “We’re looking at sending checks to Americans immediately,” Mnuchin said durin [...]

Italy has become the new hotbed of the novel coronavirus, as its number of confirmed COVID-19 cases has surpassed 53,500 and 4,825 people have died from the disease so far. Russia will send medical virologists, doctors and equipment to Italy to help combat the new coronavirus outbreak, the Russian Ministry of Defence said on Saturday. [...]

US President Donald Trump used to complain about the high oil prices that came as a result of the OPEC+ agreement, which saw many oil-exporting countries cut crude production. Now, however, is unhappy with the anomalously low price of black gold that is threatening to kill the American shale oil industry. Commenting on the ongoing oil price free fall, US President Donald Trump accused Russia and S [...]

Dr. Jack Rasmus, a professor of economics at Saint Mary's College of California, joined Radio Sputnik’s Loud & Clear Friday to discuss how the Trump administration needs to enact more drastic economic stimulus measures to prevent the coronavirus from pushing the US into a recession. In his piece titled “A Tale of Three Crises: Comparing 1929 with 2008 and 2020,” published Thursday on the [...]

China has marked its third consecutive day of no new local cases of coronavirus, as officials ease lockdown measures. The number of deaths in China from the disease has also slowed dramatically. The positive development has coincided with the government’s decision to relax strict quarantine policies put in place across the country. Even in Wuhan, the epicenter of the disease, officials said resi [...]

The spread of Covid-19 may send the global economy into a lengthy recession, but lifting sanctions that aren’t backed by the United Nations may help avoid a total catastrophe. That's according to a senior Russian senator. The drop in energy demand, unstable currency exchange rates, and the threat to people’s safety have put humanity at risk of a major economic crisis which “won’t spare any [...]

China is shipping one million surgical masks and gloves to France as it struggles to contain the coronavirus, with Europe becoming the new focal point of the global pandemic. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian confirmed the shipments on Wednesday in an interview with France's BFM TV. The first of two planes has already arrived via Belgium and a second will arrive on Thursday, he said. [...]

Iran’s New Year celebration of Nowruz finds it weathering a perfect storm of US sanctions, low oil prices and Covid-19. The resulting humanitarian crisis may make it even more resilient, as Iranians rally around their government. Iran is facing an existential crisis, brought on by a combination of economic, political and social emergencies which, when combined, threaten to bring the nation to it [...]

In 2014, shale drillers were pushed to the brink of oblivion by low oil prices, and today with prices nearing similar levels it seems the sector has not learned its lesson. It feels like 2014 for the oil industry all over again, except this time, things could get even worse. Most US shale wells have a breakeven well above today’s current oil prices. The result will be that the shale industry in [...]

The impossible has happened and the world we knew has stopped turning around. But what world order will emerge after the coronavirus pandemic is over – socialism for the rich, disaster capitalism or something completely new? These days I sometimes catch myself wishing to get the virus – in this way, at least the debilitating uncertainty would be over. [...]

The testing tools for coronavirus were delivered to 13 countries, including Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) member states Iran and North Korea, Russia’s public health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor said on Saturday. The equipment manufactured in Russia can conduct over 100,000 tests for Covid-19, and has already been used to track down the first cases of the disease in Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan [...]

The fact Wuhan has not recorded any new cases of COVID-19 for the first time since the outbreak began gives hope to the rest of the world, World Health Organisation (WHO) Chief Tedros Adhanom Gebreyesus said Friday. "Wuhan provides hope for the rest of the world, that even the most severe situation can be turned around", Tedros said at a virtual press conference. [...]

Created by the Moscow-based Military Industrial Company (Russian acronym VPK), the 4x4 protected utility vehicle, based on a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) chassis, was first unveiled at a defense exhibition last July. The VPK-Ural has already been purchased by a foreign customer, company general director Alexander Krasovitsky has said. “The vehicle is undergoing preliminary testing. Moreover, [...]

Large-scale NATO military exercises are among the few major events not to be canceled due to the global Pandemic of COVID-19. Critics say this is a waste of both money and resources. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is being called-upon to reallocate the kingdom's military budget towards health and welfare in light of the global coronavirus illness (COVID-19) pandemic, by the Peace Pledge Union (PP [...]

Russia signed $17 billion worth of arms contracts with foreign customers in 2019, expanding its portfolio with military deals with African countries totaling $1 billion, the Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation revealed on Monday. Turkey has been named one of the five biggest importers of Russian arms for 2019, according to Dmitry Shugaev, director of the Federal Service for Military [...]