| |  |  | The Reuters Daily Briefing | Friday, April 1, 2022 by Linda Noakes | Hello Here's what you need to know. Russia's Lavrov visits "friend" India, Chinese trade with Russia feels the sting, and will Europe learn lessons from the 1970s oil shock? | | | | | Today's biggest stories  A man walks past a burning gas pipeline that was hit during shelling from Russian positions in Kharkiv, Ukraine, March 31, 2022. REUTERS/Thomas Peter RUSSIA AND UKRAINE AT WAR Russian gas was still flowing to Europe despite a deadline set by President Vladimir Putin to cut it off unless customers start paying in roubles, Moscow's strongest threat to retaliate for sanctions imposed over its invasion of Ukraine.
Negotiations aimed at ending the war were set to resume by video link, with Ukrainian forces making more advances on the ground in a counterattack that has repelled the Russians from Kyiv and broken the sieges of some cities in the north and east.
The International Committee of the Red Cross is sending staff to the besieged Ukrainian port city of Mariupol and is hopeful that evacuations of thousands of civilians can begin today.
EU and Chinese leaders met for their first summit in two years with Brussels pressing Beijing for assurances that it will neither supply Russia with arms nor help Moscow circumvent Western sanctions.
Russia will increase its use of non-Western currencies for trade with countries such as India, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, as he hailed India as a friend that was not taking a "one-sided view" on the Ukraine war.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has made John Sullivan's tough job as U.S. envoy to Moscow even harder as he grapples with the Kremlin's nuclear sabre-rattling and threats to sever relations while keeping his embassy running on one-tenth the normal staff.
Here's what you need to know about the conflict right now
| BUSINESS With Russia threatening to cut off the supply of vital gas and oil, European governments are dusting off rationing plans that bring back memories of the 1973 energy crisis.
Chinese exports to Russia are slowing as the rouble swings in value, clear evidence of a ripple effect that Western sanctions over Russia's invasion of Ukraine are having in China, even as it sticks by its neighbor diplomatically.
Euro zone inflation surged to 7.5% in March, hitting another record high with months still left before it is set to peak, making grim reading for the European Central Bank, which needs to reconcile sky-high prices with vanishing economic growth.
GameStop said it would seek shareholder approval for a stock split, aiming to become the latest U.S. company to make it easier for retail investors to own its shares. Interest in so-called 'meme stocks' has flared up in the last two weeks, leading to a doubling in the video game retailer's share price.
Amazon.com workers at a warehouse in New York City's Staten Island have so far voted 57% in favor of unionizing with a final tally due today, a potential landmark victory for organized labor at the second-largest U.S. private employer. But that win contrasted with 53% of Amazon workers in Alabama rejecting unionization, in a still-not final outcome.
Investors sent Toshiba shares sharply higher as they bet the Japanese conglomerate could become the target of a bidding war after Bain Capital sounded out shareholders about a possible buyout.
|  Sri Lankan army commandos walk past a damaged bus after it was set on fire by demonstrators in Colombo, April 1, 2022. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte
WORLD
Police in Sri Lanka's capital lifted a curfew after protests in which dozens of people were arrested and several policemen were hurt near the home of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa over his handling of an economic crisis.
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan rejected opposition calls for him to resign, and accused an unnamed Western country of backing moves to oust him because he had visited Moscow recently for talks with President Vladimir Putin.
China's commercial hub of Shanghai ground to a halt after the government locked down most of the city's 26 million residents to stop the spread of COVID-19, even as official numbers put local cases falling for the second day in a row.
There are increasing signs that North Korea could soon test a nuclear weapon for the first time since 2017 in a bid to improve its arsenal and increase political pressure, U.S. and South Korean officials and analysts said.
Brazil's graft-fighting ex-judge Sergio Moro dropped his presidential bid, narrowing the field in what is shaping up to be a highly polarized October election between far-right President Jair Bolsonaro and his leftist rival Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
The severed heads of six men were discovered atop a car in a town in southwestern Mexico with a sign warning others they could face the same fate, authorities said, a grisly reminder of the gang violence plaguing the country.
U.S.
A New York state judge threw out the state's new Democratic-backed congressional map as unconstitutional and ordered lawmakers to redraw the lines, a decision that could significantly hurt the party's chances of retaining control of the U.S. Congress in November's elections.
Louisiana's Republican-controlled legislature overrode Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards' veto of a new congressional map, ensuring the state will maintain only a single majority-Black district among its six seats.
A federal judge in Florida invalidated several of the state's new Republican-backed voting restrictions, ruling that they violate minority voters' constitutional rights.
An Alabama man could today be sentenced to more than three years in prison for bringing a pickup truck full of firearms, ammunition, and Molotov cocktails to Washington on January 6, 2021, when former President Donald Trump's supporters stormed the Capitol.
Americans will be allowed to choose an X for gender on their passport applications and select their sex on Social Security cards, the Biden administration said in announcing measures to support transgender Americans against a wave of state laws targeting them.
| | | | | | | | | | | Quote of the day "Once the Fed starts hiking, there's a good chance that we will have a recession in the relatively near future. I get a sense that investors are not worried enough about this." Tim Murray Capital markets strategist at T. Rowe Price U.S. stocks and bonds flash diverging signals | | | | Video of the day  Ukraine recaptures Trostianets, a town in ruins The town in the country’s northeast was heavily damaged with residential buildings being burnt out and Russian military hardware left behind. | | | | And finally… Scientists publish the first complete human genome  Researchers have filled in gaps remaining after previous efforts, offering new promise in the search for clues regarding disease-causing mutations and genetic variation among the world's 7.9 billion people. | | | Thanks for spending part of your day with us. | | | | | |
