Новости за 22.06.2022

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman arrived in Turkey for the first time in years on Wednesday for talks with President Tayyip Erdogan aimed at fully normalising ties that were ruptured after the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The Russian economy has held up surprisingly well in the face of Western sanctions designed to cripple it – with the rouble becoming the world’s best performing currency so far this year. Soaring oil prices have once more proven a boon for this fossil fuel-dependent economy. Beneath the surface, however, supply shortages in some sectors are starting to take a heavy toll.

An earthquake impacting Afghanistan’s eastern province of Paktika on the night of June 21 has killed at least 1,000 people and injured more than 1,500. Rescue workers and volunteers are still digging through the rubble left behind by the quake, as victims are being transported by helicopter to makeshift and often inadequate medical facilities for care.

In May the official Turkish statistics institute established the inflation rate at 73.5 percent, the highest in the country since 1998 – a figure ENAG, an independent group of researchers, immediately disputed. It puts the real rate at around 160.80 percent. The director of the organisation became the target of judicial inquiries and political pressure, and is losing his position at his university.

A powerful earthquake struck a rural, mountainous region of eastern Afghanistan early on Wednesday, killing 1,000 people and injuring 1,500 more, according to a state-run news agency. Officials warned that the already grim toll would likely rise as rescuers dig through collapsed dwellings.

A Turkish vessel on Wednesday became the first foreign vessel to leave the Russian-occupied port of the battered city of Mariupol, after Ankara said it had carried out a round of "constructive" grain talks with Moscow. Read about the day’s events as they unfolded on our liveblog. All times Paris time (GMT+2).