The impact to commodity markets will keep global prices high through the end of 2024, the bank says

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has contributed to a historic shock to commodity markets that will keep global prices high through the end of 2024, according to the World Bank.

The spike in energy prices over the past two years is the biggest since the 1973 oil crisis, while the jump in food prices is the most since 2008, the World Bank said Tuesday in its commodity markets outlook report.

Russia is a leading exporter of oil, natural gas and coal, while Ukraine is a major source of wheat and corn. The situation has been exacerbated by soaring fertilizer costs and price spikes for key metals.

After nearly doubling last year, energy prices are expected to jump more than 50% this year before easing in 2023 and 2024, the World Bank said. Food prices will soar by 22.9% this year, highlighted by a 40% rise in wheat prices, according to the report. 

“These developments have started to raise the specter of stagflation,” the World Bank warned. “Policymakers should take every opportunity to increase economic growth at home and avoid actions that will bring harm to the global economy.”

Prices are expected to stay at “historically high levels” through the end of 2024, the World Bank said. 

The fear is that high prices for necessities will hit low-income families the hardest.

“The resulting increase in food and energy prices is taking a significant human and economic toll – and it will likely stall progress in reducing poverty,” Ayhan Kose, director of the World Bank’s Prospects Group, said in the report. 

Igor Volobuev, vice president of Gazprombank, one of Russia’s largest private banks and part of the Gazprom holding, quit his post and left Russia in dissent over the war in Ukraine and is planning to join the Kyiv territorial defense, he told in an interview with an independent Russian online publication “The Insider.” 

In the video, Volobuev claimed he managed to get to Kyiv despite holding a Russian passport and said he wants “to stay in Ukraine until the victory.”

Explaining his departure, Volobuev said, “My homeland is in danger now, and I cannot live a well-fed, contented life while my father, who lives in Akhtyrka, is being killed, when my relatives, acquaintances, friends are being killed.” Volobuev’s father spent a month in a cold basement but is now safe, he added.

Volobuev added that he has been thinking about fighting for Ukraine and joining Ukrainian territorial defense since the start of the war on Feb. 24.

“This is a crime on the part of Putin, the Russian authorities, and, in fact, the Russian people,” Volobuev said referring to the atrocities and war crimes committed in Ukraine.

According to Volobuev, he had been working at Gazprombank for the last 6 years and previously at Gazprom for over 16 years.

CNN has reached out to Gazprombank for a confirmation.

US Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas emphasized Wednesday the newly established streamlined process for Ukrainians seeking to come to the United States, adding that Ukrainians shouldn’t travel to the US-Mexico border to gain entry. 

The administration, Mayorkas said, is trying to convey the message to Ukrainians in the US and abroad about how to use the streamlined process, known as Uniting for Ukraine, that launched this week.

CNN reported last week that the humanitarian parole program will require Ukrainians seeking entry to the US to be sponsored by a US citizen or individual, which would include resettlement organizations and non-profit organizations.

“This program will be fast. It will be streamlined. And it will ensure the United States honors its commitment to go to the people of Ukraine and (they) need not go through our southern border,” US President Joe Biden said last Thursday when announcing the program while delivering an update on Ukraine and Russia.

The Ukrainian applicants will need to undergo rigorous security vetting and checks, including biographic and biometric screening, and complete vaccinations and other public health requirements, including receiving the Covid-19 vaccine, to be eligible. Ukrainians must have also been residents in Ukraine as of February 11.

Where things stand at the border: The Department of Homeland Security processed more than 20,000 Ukrainians at the US-Mexico border and granted them humanitarian parole since March 11, when officials began exempting them on a case-by-case basis following Russia’s invasion, according to a court declaration.

Mayorkas told lawmakers that the department surged resources to the California-Mexico border, where hundreds of Ukrainians gathered, to help with processing. 

“We have focused resources on the port of entry at San Ysidro with a majority of Ukrainians who flew to Mexico with the hope of entering the United States assembled. We have drawn down that population of Ukrainians dramatically. We surged resources of US Customs and Border Protection,” Mayorkas said. 

CNN’s Arlette Saenz and Kate Sullivan contributed reporting to this post. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned on Thursday that any country interfering in Ukraine would be met with a “lightning-fast” response from Moscow.

“We have all the tools for this — ones that no one can brag about. And we won’t brag. We will use them if needed. And I want everyone to know this,” he added.

He did not provide further details on the “tools” he was referring to.  

“All the decisions have been made in this regard,” Putin told lawmakers, vowing to achieve “all the goals” of the Russian “special operation” in Ukraine. 

Parts of the Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine have endured intense attacks over the past 24 hours, according to regional officials.

Serhiy Haidai, head of the regional military administration, said a woman died in shelling that hit the hospital in Severodonetsk, a city that has seen widespread destruction after weeks of attacks.

“They [the Russians] wanted to finish off the wounded,” Haidai said. “The Russians knew that the hospital was not empty, there were patients in different conditions with doctors; it did not stop them.”

“The destruction of the building is significant. Several floors were damaged at once,” he added.

A CNN team in the city Wednesday heard frequent artillery barrages, which local police said were around the hospital.

Ukrainian officials said that almost the entire territory of the Luhansk region suffered from shelling over the past 24 hours, with the worst hitting Rubizhne and Lysychansk. The Russians have been trying to force the towns’ surrender for weeks.

The shelling had destroyed gas pipelines to most of the region, Haidai said. “The gas companies repairing damaged areas every single day. Gas is supplied to only six towns and villages.”

Mykola Khanatov, head of Popasna city military administration, told Ukrainian television that there were just three words to describe the situation there: horror, sorrow, pain.

“Still around 2,000 people remain in Popasna. We are trying to organize the evacuation every day. We evacuate around 50 people daily. But unfortunately, we only control half of the city, the other half is occupied,” Khanatov said, adding that there had been an airstrike on a nine-story building on Tuesday night, and it collapsed. Rescue work was continuing.

“Popasna is Armageddon. Nothing is working there right now: there’s no gas, electricity or water. There are no doctors,” Khanatov said.

The Luhansk authorities said one person had been killed in nearby Hirske. 

“Russian troops are continuously shelling the settlements of the Hirske Community starting from 5 a.m. They are using GRAD [rockets] and artillery,” Haidai said.

Poland and Bulgaria are receiving gas from their EU neighbors, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Wednesday.

This comes after Russian energy giant Gazprom halted gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria on Wednesday, after both countries refused to pay the Russian energy giant in rubles, the company said in a statement. 

In a statement, von der Leyen called it “another provocation from the Kremlin” and accused Moscow of using gas to “blackmail” the bloc.

The official also stressed the need for reliable energy partners, promising the end of the era of Russian fossil fuels in Europe.

Further in her statement, she committed to ensuring a plan for the “medium term” for sufficient gas supply and storage, and also looked forward to investing in a “green transition.”

“In the longer term, REPowerEU will also help us move to a more reliable, secure and sustainable energy supply. We will present our plans to speed up the green transition in mid-May. Every euro we invest in renewables and energy efficiency is a down payment on our future energy independence,” she said. 

Bulgaria is “in constant communication” with the European Commission as “joint supplies at the EU level are being discussed,” Bulgaria’s Energy Ministry said in a statement Wednesday. 

Speaking at a briefing in the capital Sofia, Bulgaria’s Energy Minister Alexander Nikolov said “the consumption of natural gas in Bulgaria is guaranteed for at least a month ahead and at the moment there is no need to limit consumption.” 

Nikolov said a warning from Russia’s Gazprom was received on Tuesday that said supplies would be interrupted. He said under the current contract, Bulgaria’s gas operator Bulgargaz has fulfilled all of its obligations and that Gazprom is not fulfilling the contractual commitments on the part of the supplier. 

“It is obvious that in the current situation of war in Ukraine, natural gas is used by Russia as a political and economic weapon,” said Nikolov, adding that Bulgaria won’t hold talks under pressure.

Bulgaria’s natural gas operating companies have ensured the continuity of “alternative supplies,” the ministry said. 

“Our country is a loyal partner in existing contracts and we will not jeopardize supplies to our neighbors,” Nikolov said.

CNN’s Radina Gigova contributed reporting to this post.

A senior US administration official said the release of Trevor Reed was the result of “months and months of hard careful work across the US government” on the matter, noting that “the conversations on this particular issue have accelerated recently to get us to this point.” 

One driving factor was concern of Reed’s health. His family has expressed worry about his likely exposure to tuberculosis as well as lingering effects from having Covid-19.

The official, speaking to reporters on a background call Wednesday, said that “ultimately, those negotiations led the President to have to make a very hard decision with a decision to commute the sentence of Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian smuggler convicted of conspiring to import cocaine.” 

The official did not provide details about how or why Yaroshenko was chosen for the swap, but noted that he had served the majority of his US sentence and is now in Russian custody.

“This is a tough call for a President, President Biden made it to bring home an American whose health was a source of an intense concern, and to deliver on his commitment to resolve these hard cases and reunite Americans with their loved ones,” the official added.

Reed is now on his way back to his family in the United States.

The Department of Homeland Security processed more than 20,000 Ukrainians at the US-Mexico border and granted them humanitarian parole since March 11, when officials began exempting them on a case-by-case basis following Russia’s invasion, according to a newly filed court declaration.

Blas Nuñez-Neto, a top Homeland Security official, outlined the Biden administration’s plans for an influx of migrants at the US-Mexico border when a public health authority, known as Title 42, lifts in a court filing following a federal judge’s intent to temporarily block the wind down. 

DHS, Nunez-Neto said, will be “significantly curtailing” those exception, given the launch of Uniting for Ukraine, a streamlined process for Ukrainians seeking to come to the United States. 

“The Department strongly encourages all potential applicants to apply directly from Europe, where they will have greater support than if they apply from Mexico or elsewhere,” the filing reads. 

The weeks of negotiations that resulted in Trevor Reed’s release from detention in Russia will have no impact on the Biden administration’s approach to the Ukraine war.

“It represents no change – zero – to our approach to the appalling violence in Ukraine,” the first official said. The official said that the negotiations focused on “a discrete issue on which we were able to make an arrangement with the Russians.”

The officials said the negotiations did not involve additional “senior level of travel” to Russia but that the case had been raised at multiple levels, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s meeting in Geneva with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov prior to the start of the war.

A second senior administration official noted this was done by the interagency, but also helped by media interest in Reed’s case.