Bloomberg Politics

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Ukraine’s counteroffensive has “definitely” begun, though he said its military hadn’t achieved any breakthroughs during “very intense” battles in the past five days. “All the counteroffensive attempts made so far have failed,” Putin told reporters in Sochi on Friday in televised remarks. Ukraine’s “offensive potential” remains, he said, and Russian forces “will proceed from these realities in developing our actions in the near future.”

Boris Johnson secured prestigious titles for several key allies, including MPs Jacob Rees-Mogg and Priti Patel and aides who worked in Downing Street during the “partygate” scandal, as the UK government published the former prime minister’s so-called resignation honors list.

China supports South Africa in hosting various BRICS activities this year, President Xi Jinping told his counterpart Cyril Ramaphosa Friday in a phone call, according to a statement from the Chinese Foreign Ministry.

George Santos’s $500,000 bail package in his criminal fraud case was guaranteed by family members, not political figures, the Republican congressman’s lawyer said in a court filing.

A federal judge in Florida who handled Donald Trump’s dispute last fall with the Justice Department over classified documents found at his home appears to have been initially assigned to the former president’s new criminal case, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Mpho Makwana, the chairman of South Africa’s beleaguered state power utility, said a change in its management structure has helped improve its plant performance, enabling blackouts to be eased, and further gains can be expected.

President Joe Biden will officially kick off his 2024 presidential run June 17 at a Philadelphia rally hosted by organized labor in a state where a narrow win helped him clinch the White House in 2020.

The UK opposition Labour Party watered down its £140 billion ($176 billion) flagship green energy plan days before it was due to be presented as concern that it was too expensive and ambitious created mounting tensions among senior figures.

China has called on the US to fulfill its “obligation” to allow Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee to attend a summit in San Francisco this year, underscoring the difficulty of engaging with sanctioned officials.