Sunday, October 5, 2025
Russia condemns U.S. strike on alleged drug vessel near Venezuela
Russia on Sunday condemned a U.S. strike on a vessel allegedly carrying illegal drugs off the coast of Venezuela and cautioned about the dangers of potential U.S. escalation in the entire Caribbean region.
Russian President Vladimir Putin's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, spoke to his Venezuelan counterpart, Yvan Gil, by telephone on Sunday, the Russian foreign ministry said.
"Sergei Lavrov said that Russia strongly condemns the new strike by the U.S. armed forces on October 3 on a ship in international waters near Venezuela," the ministry said.
"The ministers expressed serious concern about Washington's escalating actions in the Caribbean Sea that are fraught with far-reaching consequences for the region," it said.
Four people were killed in the October 3 strike on the vessel which Washington accused of transporting "substantial amounts of narcotics - headed to America to poison our people."
Moscow said that there was "no certainty that the United States will not in any way link its declared war against drug cartels with the situation in Haiti".
Russia also cautioned against attempts to broadly interpret a recent UN Security Council resolution to more than double the size of an 15-month-old underfunded and understaffed international security mission combating armed gangs in Haiti.
Russia, China and Pakistan abstained from the vote on the measure put forward by the United States and Panama. The remaining 13 council members voted in favour.
"The Russian side has confirmed its full support and solidarity with the leadership and people of Venezuela in the current context," the Russian ministry said.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/russia-condemns-u-strike-alleged-155538922.html
White House: Fed layoffs will start if shutdown talks 'going nowhere'
The Trump administration will start mass layoffs of federal workers if President Donald Trump decides negotiations with congressional Democrats to end a partial government shutdown are "absolutely going nowhere," White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said.
As the shutdown entered its fifth day, Hassett told CNN's "State of the Union" program that he still saw a chance that Democrats would back down, averting a costly shutdown and federal employee layoffs that have been threatened by White House budget director Russell Vought.
"President Trump and Russ Vought are lining things up and getting ready to act if they have to, but hoping that they don't," he said.
"If the president decides that the negotiations are absolutely going nowhere, then there will start to be layoffs. But I think that everybody is still hopeful that when we get a fresh start at the beginning of the week, that we can get the Democrats to see that it's just common sense to avoid layoffs like that."
But there were no tangible signs of negotiations to end the standoff since Trump met with top congressional leaders last week. The shutdown began on Oct. 1, the start of fiscal year 2026, after Senate Democrats rejected a short-term funding measure that would keep federal agencies open through Nov. 21.
Democrats are demanding a permanent extension of enhanced premium tax credits to help Americans purchase private health insurance through the Affordable Care Act and written assurances that the White House will not try to unilaterally cancel spending agreed to in any deal.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/layoffs-start-shutdown-talks-going-141146889.html
Oil Prices Set To Jump After OPEC+ Raises Output By Far Less Than Expected
OPEC+ will raise oil output from November by 137,000 barrels per day, it said on Sunday, opting for the same fairly modest monthly increase as in October and far less than the 500k+ speculated by the Bloomberg "source" who continues to be short oil and appears to buy every dip.
The group consisting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries plus Russia and some smaller producers has increased its oil output targets by more than 2.7 million bpd this year - equating to about 2.5% of global demand - as it continues the return of 1.65 million barrels a day they cut in April 2023.
The process of unwinding the April 2023 cuts began last month, when they raised their collective target by an initial 137,000 barrels a day with effect from October. The month before they had completed the return of 2.2 million barrels of output, cut in November 2023, a year ahead of schedule. The eight countries will continue to meet monthly, with the next gathering scheduled for Nov. 2.
Following Sunday’s meeting, the new production targets for the eight countries for November are shown in the table below in thousands of barrels a day alongside their limits for August, September and October and their actual production in August, as reported by OPEC’s secondary sources.
The table above does not reflect additional cuts to compensate for earlier over-production that have been made by several countries. Those compensation cuts, most recently revised on Oct. 1, reduce the effective output targets to those shown below.
Brent prices fell below $65 per barrel on Friday, as most analysts predict a supply glut in the fourth quarter and in 2026 due to slower demand and rising U.S. supply. Prices are trading below this year's peaks of $82 per barrel but above $60 per barrel seen in May.
In the run-up to the meeting, Russia and Saudi Arabia, the two biggest producers in the OPEC+ group, had different views, Reuters sources said.
Russia was advocating for a modest output increase, the same as in October, to avoid pressuring oil prices and because it would struggle to raise output owing to sanctions over its war in Ukraine, two sources said this week. Saudi Arabia would have preferred double, triple or even quadruple that figure - 274,000 bpd, 411,000 bpd or 548,000 bpd respectively - because it allegedly has spare capacity and wants to regain market share more quickly.
OPEC views the global economic outlook as steady and market fundamentals as healthy because of low oil inventories, it said in a statement on Sunday.
Scott Shelton at TP ICAP Group told Reuters that oil prices may rise on Monday by up to $1 per barrel as the November production increase turned out to be modest.
Jorge Leon at Rystad Energy said: "OPEC+ stepped carefully after witnessing how nervous the market had become ... The group is walking a tightrope between maintaining stability and clawing back market share in a surplus environment."
OPEC+ output cuts had peaked in March, amounting to 5.85 million bpd in total. The cuts were made up of three elements: voluntary cuts of 2.2 million bpd, 1.65 million bpd by eight members and a further 2 million bpd by the whole group.
The eight producers plan to fully unwind one element of those cuts - 2.2 million bpd - by the end of September. For October, they started removing the second layer of 1.65 million bpd with the increase of 137,000 bpd. The eight producers will meet again on Nov. 2.
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/oil-prices-set-jump-after-opec-raises-output-far-less-expected
Trump: Putin's New START proposal 'good idea'
United States President Donald Trump answered journalists' questions on the South Lawn of the White House on Sunday.
When asked by a reporter what he thought about Russian President Vladimir Putin's latest proposal related to the New START Treaty, in which he offered to extend the agreement for another year, Trump said that he thought this "sounds like a good idea to me."
The Kremlin recently commented that Moscow has yet to officially hear from the US side on this matter.
https://breakingthenews.net/Article/Trump:-Putin's-New-START-proposal-'good-idea'/64926644
Rubio: War in Gaza still hasn't ended
United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke to NBC News on Sunday about the ongoing situation in Gaza, cautioning that the war in the region isn't over yet, despite the parties involved agreeing to a US-presented peace plan.
"We will know very quickly whether Hamas is serious or not by how these technical talks go in terms of the logistics," he stated. Israeli and Hamas delegations are set to meet in Egypt on Monday to discuss the details of the peace plan.
Talking about the second phase of the agreement, which aims for Hamas' disarmament and demobilization, Rubio commented that it is "not going to be easy."
https://breakingthenews.net/Article/Rubio:-War-in-Gaza-still-hasn't-ended/64926620