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The skyscraper housing offices of the state-owned oil giant suffered only “minor damage” with no casualties, according to Riyadh

A skyscraper housing offices of Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil giant Aramco has been damaged in a missile and drone attack by Yemen’s Houthis. The group claimed the Sunday strike came in retaliation for Saudi-led attacks over the weekend that reportedly killed more than 50 people, including women and children.

The Aramco Tower, located in Riyadh’s King Abdullah Financial District, sustained visible damage across several floors, with windows shattered, parts of its glass facade blown out, and internal structures exposed.

Footage circulating online showed extensive damage to the exterior of the skyscraper, while witnesses reported hearing multiple explosions across the Saudi capital.

NOW: Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry reported no casualties after missile debris damaged an Aramco building in Riyadh’s King Abdullah Financial District. https://t.co/QhBkivFJ9x

Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry acknowledged that an administrative building belonging to Aramco had been targeted in an “attempted attack,” but insisted that falling shrapnel had caused only “minor damage,” with no injuries or fatalities.

New footage of the Aramco tower in the King Abdullah Financial District shows heavy damage on the upper floors. Windows are blown out. Structural impacts are visible. https://t.co/QdOAtYQmIH

The Saudi-led coalition said its air defenses had intercepted several missiles, including two launched toward Riyadh, as well as projectiles targeting the kingdom’s Eastern Province and southern regions.

Another Angle of the Houthi strike on Aramco Tower in Riyadh .

Yemen’s Ansar Allah movement, better known as the Houthis, claimed responsibility for a series of coordinated attacks involving ballistic and cruise missiles and drones. The group’s military spokesman, Yahya Saree, said the targets included Riyadh’s financial district, King Khalid International Airport, Aramco oil storage facilities, and the eastern Saudi city of Abqaiq.

The attacks followed a wave of deadly strikes in Yemen. On Saturday, airstrikes blamed on the Saudi-led coalition hit the village of al-Shariyah, east of Sanaa, killing at least 33 people, including 13 children and eight women, according to the Houthi-run Health Ministry. At least 39 others were reportedly wounded.

A day earlier, an attack on a crowded market in Taiz province killed at least 30 people. The Houthis accused Saudi Arabia of carrying out airstrikes, while forces aligned with Yemen’s Saudi-backed government blamed the Houthis themselves.

The latest escalation comes amid renewed fighting in Yemen, where the Houthis made major territorial gains in September, seizing strategic Red Sea ports and islands near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, one of the world’s busiest maritime chokepoints. The militants also encircled Taiz, Yemen’s third-largest city, while Yemeni troops have launched a counteroffensive supported by Saudi airstrikes.

At the same time, the Houthis have stepped up missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia’s vital oil infrastructure, targeting Aramco facilities, including the Ras Tanura refinery and the Abqaiq processing complex, as well as airports and military installations. The campaign has increased pressure on Riyadh as it struggles to protect its energy industry and maintain export routes amid the wider US-Israeli war on Iran.

Yemen has been engulfed in civil war since 2014, with Saudi Arabia launching a military intervention in its impoverished southern neighbor the following year. More than a decade of conflict has left over 22 million people in need of humanitarian assistance and millions displaced, with nearly 300,000 forced from their homes since August alone, according to the UN.

A UN-brokered truce in 2022 brought a relative lull in fighting, but hostilities erupted again in July. The Houthis have vowed to continue attacking Saudi targets until Riyadh ends its military operations and lifts its blockade of Yemen.

Beijing has dismissed US media reports of espionage as “groundless speculation” aimed at smearing China

American AI chipmaking giant Nvidia has launched an independent investigation into allegations that its founder and CEO, Jensen Huang, was targeted in a Chinese intelligence ‘honeypot’ operation, after the billionaire admitted to cheating on his wife.

The 63-year-old billionaire did not identify the woman involved in the affair or explicitly mention China in his Sunday message to employees. However, he acknowledged the national security concerns raised by media reports, pledged to cooperate with the investigation announced by Nvidia’s board of directors, and reaffirmed his commitment to protecting the company and US national security.

“I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry,” Huang wrote.

The admission follows reports by the New York Times and Financial Times alleging that Huang had developed a romantic relationship with Alice Huang, also known as Huang Le, a Chinese executive formerly associated with the Singapore-based technology company Megaspeed International.

According to the reports, US intelligence officials believe the woman was recruited by China’s Ministry of State Security to gather information about Nvidia and potentially influence its CEO to lobby Washington to ease restrictions on exports of advanced artificial intelligence chips to China.

Beijing has rejected the spying accusations. “The relevant report is based on groundless speculation and is purely aimed at smearing and slandering China,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said on October 30.

Trump had been briefed on the intelligence allegations roughly a year ago, while Huang had not received any warning from US agencies, according to the NYT.

Trump on taking Jensen Huang on his upcoming trip to Asia. "I would certainly take him. I haven't heard he's done anything wrong." https://t.co/uAsQhEe8ws

The Nvidia CEO subsequently accompanied Trump on a state visit to China in May, even traveling aboard Air Force One. In September, Huang and his wife, Lori, also attended Trump’s state dinner for Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the White House.

Trump defended Huang on Sunday, telling reporters that the Nvidia chief “hasn’t done anything wrong,” adding that he would take Huang on another upcoming trip to Asia.

The US president is scheduled to visit the Philippines before traveling to China for the APEC summit on November 18–19, where a potential trilateral meeting with Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin is being discussed.

Nvidia’s board said on Sunday that a committee of independent directors, assisted by outside legal counsel, would investigate reports of a “foreign intelligence effort” targeting Huang. It stressed that it had no reason to believe either US national security or the company’s secrets had been compromised, while reaffirming its confidence in Huang’s leadership.

The scandal comes amid an intensifying technological rivalry between Washington and Beijing, with advanced AI chips emerging as a major point of contention. Huang has maintained close ties with Trump and has advocated easing certain US export restrictions on Nvidia’s products.

Washington has repeatedly accused Beijing of cyberespionage, including alleged attacks on NASA, the Federal Reserve and other sensitive networks. China has consistently rejected such accusations, accusing the US of exploiting cybersecurity concerns to discredit the country.

The UK-led Joint Expeditionary Force will focus on confronting Moscow’s submarines, Defence Staff Chief Richard Knighton has told the daily

The UK-led Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF), a naval grouping aimed at Russia, is about to expand its posture in the North Atlantic, Arctic, and Baltic regions, Britain’s chief of defence staff, Sir Richard Knighton, has told the Financial Times.

The newspaper reported on Sunday that parties to the initiative, which also includes the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, are expected to sign a pact aimed at bolstering the grouping’s presence on Tuesday, ahead of the Atlantic Future Forum conference.

Air Chief Marshal Knighton told the FT that the countries would move “beyond memorandums of understanding and exchanges and meetings into really practical measures.”

He named confronting Russian submarines in those waters among the JEF’s key objectives.

Knighton played up claims about a military threat supposedly coming from Russia, describing the current period as the “most dangerous” in decades.

The head of the British Armed Forces argued that in the face of the US long-term pivot toward the Asia-Pacific region, European countries need to step up their rearmament drive. With this in mind, the UK government has to find ways to sell increased military spending to the British public, Knighton told the FT.

The UK, the Netherlands, Nordic nations, and the Baltic states signed a statement of intent to set up a new “multinational maritime force” outside of NATO to counter Russia in April.

Moscow has repeatedly dismissed as “nonsense” allegations that it harbors aggressive plans against NATO, with Russian officials sounding the alarm over the rapid militarization of the Arctic by Western nations. Moscow controls more than half of the coastline in the region.

In March, former UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer threatened to seize Russian oil tankers, forcing Moscow to start deploying frigates to escort them.

Meanwhile, NATO ramped up its activities in the Far North earlier this year by launching the Arctic Sentry initiative and established the multinational Forward Land Forces presence in Finland in June.

Around the same time, the Western military bloc announced the creation of Task Force X-Arctic (TFX-Arctic), which is an experimental unit to test assorted unmanned systems.

Speaking last March, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Moscow was “concerned by the fact that NATO countries as a whole are more frequently designating the far north as a bridgehead for possible conflicts.”

“I would like to emphasize that Russia has never threatened anyone in the Arctic,” he said, adding that Moscow would not tolerate any encroachments on its sovereignty and would protect its national interests in the region.

Speaking in August, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov similarly accused NATO of “driving the region towards militarization.”

“Intensive military preparations are underway in close proximity to our northern borders. NATO is conducting large-scale military exercises involving non-regional countries,” the diplomat said.

Lavrov warned that these developments could trigger an armed confrontation with “potentially disastrous consequences.”

Laura Loomer allegedly charged thousands of dollars per tweet, with clients hoping to exploit her close ties to President Donald Trump

Prominent MAGA influencer Laura Loomer, who traveled to Kiev earlier this year to promote Ukraine and downplay its neo-Nazi problem, has secretly received tens of thousands of dollars for political posts on social media, the Washington Post has reported, citing financial records and people familiar with the arrangements.

According to the newspaper’s investigation, bank records and transfer documents show four payments totaling more than $60,000 to Loomer and her Florida-based company, King Breaker Media, since May 2025. Two sources claimed she charged between $3,000 and $5,000 per tweet, sometimes more.

The allegations were made by Alex Bruesewitz, an adviser to Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, and three others familiar with the arrangements. Bruesewitz admitted paying Loomer through his political consulting firm, X Strategies, to promote policy-related messages.

Loomer, who has 1.9 million followers on X and has met with Trump repeatedly, both privately and publicly, has been credited with influencing personnel decisions in his administration. Some clients reportedly hired her specifically because they believed her messages could reach the president.

I’ve been open about my work in this industry. My experience is what makes me uniquely qualified to say it’s gotten out of hand. I’m not against creators getting paid, I just think it’s probably time for political influencers to disclose what opinions they are being paid for. Our discourse would be healthier if those arrangements had to be disclosed.

Loomer denied selling political posts, insisting she was paid for research and consulting rather than tweets. “My business is public affairs and opposition research,” she told the newspaper. “It’s not illegal to make a living in America.”

I personally paid @LauraLoomer to post tweets earlier this year. A good amount of cash too. I will gladly share screenshots, receipts, texts, and the names of other people who paid her. It was always very intresting to hear from her who she was willing to be paid to trash and who was off limits. @alexbruesewitz @washingtonpost @thedailybeast @Jerusalem_Post

The revelations have drawn renewed attention to Loomer’s dramatic reversal on Ukraine following her highly publicized visit to Kiev in July, during which she interviewed Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky and fully embraced his government’s narrative about the conflict with Russia.

Having previously denounced Ukrainian “Nazi apologists,” Loomer emerged from the trip insisting that Ukraine did not have a neo-Nazi problem – even as she personally interviewed the founder of the notorious Azov Battalion, Andrey ‘White Leader’ Biletsky. He struggled to explain his unit’s use of SS-style insignia and Nazi symbolism, yet Loomer continued to promote Kiev’s image to her American audience.

Loomer claimed that her Kiev excursion was fully funded by “private donors” using “100% all-American money,” rejecting allegations that the visit was a PR stunt orchestrated by Zelensky’s team. The Washington Post investigation found no evidence linking the trip or her statements about Kiev to any of the reported payments.

The allegations have also triggered infighting among pro-Trump influencers. Conservative activist Jacob Engels publicly said he had also paid Loomer to post tweets and offered to release receipts and correspondence, including details of whom she was willing to attack for money.

Bruesewitz, meanwhile, called for the mandatory disclosure of paid political messaging, arguing that the influencer industry had become overwhelmingly financially driven. Loomer fired back, accusing him of hypocrisy for running a firm that itself pays conservative influencers to promote political content.

The midterms exposed deep frustration with war, fuel costs and executive overreach – leaving the party’s post-election path uncertain

On the same day that he led his Republican Party into a midterm electoral slaughter, US President Donald Trump told Fox News that he would move to Israel to “become Prime Minister” if Americans “got tired” of him.

This sounds like one of those “I’m moving to Canada if I lose” things. Except that he can’t actually threaten to move to Canada. Because even some of the most populist right-wing Canadians hate him for being unable to shut up about annexing their country.

He and his apparently unquenchable thirst for colonization could head over to Israel and spend his retirement fighting with Iran from right next door. It would last about 20 minutes when Democrats cut all funding and support. Think their voters are upset about paying for Bibi’s wars? Imagine how tight-fisted they’d be with ‘Trump’s Israel.’ Iran wins, opens the Strait of Hormuz, global fuel prices stabilize, and Trump finally gets a Nobel Peace Prize for single-handedly regime changing two of the biggest global pariahs.

Barely a few hours after the midterms, Trump was already warming up to the idea of just vetoing anything that the Democrat-majority Congress tries to do. Sources close to him say that he’d also resort to executive orders. All of which would leave Congress to prioritize spending their time impeaching him and hauling his enablers and sycophants in front of congressional hearings. Great plan!

Trump doesn’t much see himself as the problem in this election, suggesting that it was the GOP candidates who weren’t up to par. Of course they weren’t – they had to be tailored to his personal satisfaction to even survive the primary process, thoroughly disqualifying them in the eyes of everyone else.

He did recognize that Americans don’t like high fuel prices, but nonetheless considers that they just need to deal with it as he suicide bombs the American economy to assuage Bibi’s perpetual fever dream of Iran getting nukes. But more probably because his family and cronies are wheeling and dealing with Israel and the checks won’t clear until the dirty work is done. 

But here’s what we know about how Americans really feel from exit polling that surveyed about the same percentage of Republicans and Democrats. Most of them (60%) considered their Congressional vote little more than a Trump performance review. Most of them (53%) strongly disapprove of the job that he’s doing. Only 37% believe that he’s been fighting for people like them – the average American – with 62% feeling that he prioritizes his own personal interests over the nation’s, and made the economy worse (65%). They don’t even particularly like the Democrats (35% “strongly unfavorably”), and admit to being hardcore capitalists (57%), but they still think that the Democrats would do a better economic job than Trump at this point.

Americans across party lines feel overwhelmingly (71%) that the Republican-majority Congress abdicated its constitutional duty to exercise checks and balances on Trump’s executive powers.

The top voting issue was the domestic economy (39%) with cost of living a major consideration for 89% of voters. Their last priority was foreign policy at just 4%. In other words, by starting an economy-crushing war with Iran for his Israeli donors, Trump was literally doing the polar opposite of what Americans wanted him to focus on.

Three quarters of voters even cited the Iran war as a major factor in their electoral choice. But Trump wouldn’t know that from watching Fox News’ neocon slop all day long. Or from consulting with the ego fluffers who surround him and obviously only tell him what they think he wants to hear. Or from obsessively scrolling in the algorithmically-controlled echo chambers rife with nutjob influencers and bots, curated by the tech broligarchy more interested in government contracts and influence than the priorities of the average American.

At least in Israel, his policy passions actually might have a shot at aligning with those of the electorate. Because in the US, where a whopping 3% of the voters are Jewish, two-thirds of them still voted Democrat.

So what’s next for right-wing populism in America? For now, it’s homeless. No one within a mile of Trump has any appeal.

The festival also fuels one of India’s busiest shopping seasons, boosting trade across sectors

The city of Ayodhya in northern India was lit up with three million lamps for this year’s Diwali, celebrated by Hindus around the world over the weekend. The celebrations in Ayodhya – regarded as one of Hinduism’s holiest cities – featured grand religious rituals, cultural performances, and a Ramayana-themed drone show, blending faith, tradition, and technology.

The temple city has hosted Diwali festivities under the name Deepotsav since 2017. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath described this year’s 10th edition of the festival as a celebration of Ayodhya’s development and cultural revival, saying it reflected efforts to reconnect the temple town with its religious and historical heritage.

Diwali, or Deepavali, is India’s premier multi-day Festival of Lights, symbolizing the triumph of light over darkness, good over evil, and knowledge over ignorance. It commemorates the return of Lord Rama, Sita, and Lakshmana to the kingdom of Ayodhya after 14 years of exile, when villagers are believed to have lit clay lamps to guide them home.

In a video released by the Ministry of Tourism on Sunday, drone shots captured the scale of the celebrations.

On the auspicious occasion of Diwali, may the festival of lights bring happiness, prosperity and new beginnings to everyone.

The festival is also closely tied to the country’s busiest shopping season, with economic activity typically picking up in the weeks around it. Gold demand rose in India after prices fell to a seven-month low this week, according to a Reuters report. Traders quoted by the agency said sales on Dhanteras – the auspicious day marking the start of the five-day Diwali festival – are expected to be about 10% higher than last year.

In her report, RT India correspondent Rujuta Thete notes that Diwali-related trade last year reached a record $64.31 billion, up 25% year on year. For many brands, the festive season accounts for 30-40% of annual business, she said. But the spending boom is not limited to big companies.

Diwali’s economic pulse reaches small shopkeepers and artisans too, as money spent on every lamp and every sweet flows directly into the hands of millions, helping keep India’s economic engine running. Watch the full report. 

The rear-end crash south of Cairo left 110 injured and several train carriages derailed

Seven people have been killed and 110 injured in a violent train collision in Egypt that hurled several passenger carriages off the tracks.

The crash occurred on Sunday in the Al-Ayyat district of Giza province, south of Cairo, when one passenger train slammed into the rear of another, according to Egyptian Railways.

Footage from the scene shows derailed train cars and twisted wreckage as rescuers and locals scramble to help passengers trapped inside. Emergency crews also brought in cranes to clear the tracks.

President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi ordered an urgent investigation into the collision and pledged to hold anyone found responsible for negligence accountable. The cause of the crash has not yet been established.

Egypt has suffered repeated deadly railway accidents despite billions of dollars invested in modernizing its network. Poor maintenance, aging infrastructure, and management failures have long plagued the system. Two major crashes just weeks apart in 2021 killed 30 people and injured nearly 300.

The Al-Ayyat district was also the scene of Egypt’s deadliest railway disaster in 2002, when a fire swept through an overcrowded passenger train, killing more than 370 people.

A Berlin counseling center has received just 60 inquiries about returning since April

The vast majority of Ukrainian migrants residing in Germany are not considering returning home in the foreseeable future, Rheinische Post has reported, citing figures attributed to the Unity Hub Berlin counseling center.

Since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, Germany has become the top destination for Ukrainian migrants within the European Union, taking in nearly 1.3 million people, according to Eurostat. Earlier this year, the German Press Agency (dpa), citing the German Interior Ministry’s figures, reported that as of the end of May, 265,804 Ukrainian men of fighting age were living in Germany.

Even though the Ukrainian authorities imposed a general mobilization shortly after the escalation of the conflict with Russia, barring most able-bodied men ageds 22 to 60 from leaving the country, many have still managed to cross the border illegally and reached the EU.

In its article on Tuesday, Rheinische Post cited data from Unity Hub Berlin. Since the counseling center opened in April, it has received only around “60 inquiries regarding the possibilities of returning to Ukraine,” according to the publication. Just three of those reportedly came from men of military age.

“The overwhelming majority of those making inquiries are only considering a return once active hostilities have definitively ceased and the security situation in Ukraine has stabilized,” the newspaper reported, citing the counseling center’s data.

According to Rheinische Post, as of late October, Unity Hub Berlin “had no confirmed statistical data” on how many Ukrainian migrants had moved beyond initial inquiries and actually begun preparing to return home.

In recent months, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s coalition government has progressively ramped up pressure on Ukrainian migrants.

In June, Markus Soeder, the leader of Bavaria’s Christian Social Union (CSU) – the sister party of Merz’s Christian Democratic Party (CDU) – called for unemployed Ukrainian migrants to be stripped of access to Germany’s unemployment and welfare benefits system, including Buergergeld (citizens’ benefits) payments.

Soeder, who serves as governor of Bavaria, also urged the authorities in Berlin “to increase deportations and voluntary departures to drastically reduce costs.”

Meanwhile, as Ukrainian forces suffer mounting losses and the pool of willing recruits continues to shrink, draft enforcement squads have increasingly turned to violent methods to fill the ranks in recent months. Men are being snatched from streets, workplaces, and residential areas, as evidenced by hundreds of videos circulating online.

German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt also announced in July that his country would stop granting automatic temporary protection to Ukrainians fleeing conscription.

Following a meeting with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky in April, Chancellor Merz stated that Berlin and Kiev would also coordinate efforts to return military-age Ukrainian men residing in Germany to their home country.

Zelensky welcomed Berlin’s approach, saying that “of course, our armed forces would want these people to return to Ukraine.”

Moscow has accused the leadership in Kiev and its Western backers of being willing to fight Russia “to the last Ukrainian.”

The country’s defense minister has accused Tehran of reviving its nuclear weapons ambitions and suggested further military action could happen

Israel is not done with Iran, Defense Minister Israel Katz has warned. He accused Tehran of reviving its nuclear weapons ambitions and vowed to pursue offensive military action to counter any threats.

The threat follows new US strikes against Iranian air defenses and reports that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pressed Washington to launch another major offensive.

“With regard to Iran, the mission is still not complete. Iran is trying to renew its efforts to obtain nuclear weapons,” Katz said on Sunday, as cited by Israeli media.

Tehran has consistently denied seeking nuclear weapons and maintains that its nuclear program serves peaceful purposes.

US President Donald Trump claimed in late October that US-Israeli strikes had destroyed Iran’s nuclear enrichment capabilities but acknowledged that some suspect sites remained. The IAEA has found no evidence that Tehran has rebuilt damaged facilities, although it remains unable to verify Iran’s enriched uranium stockpiles.

On Friday, Trump confirmed “minor strikes” against Iranian air defenses on Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz, but insisted Washington had made “a lot of progress” in negotiations with Tehran.

The US and Israel launched a major offensive against Iran on February 28 with the stated goals of destroying its nuclear and missile capabilities and bringing about regime change. Despite the killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other senior officials, Iran’s government remains in power.

On Saturday, Iran’s military declared itself stronger than at the start of the war, while the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had lifted its self-imposed 2,000 km limit on missile range. Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei warned last week that renewed US-Israeli attacks would trigger an immediate response without geographical restrictions.

Netanyahu’s coalition lost Israel’s October 27 election, while Trump’s Republicans lost control of both chambers of Congress in Tuesday’s US midterms, partly due to public frustration over the Iran war.

Reuters reported on Thursday that Tehran had submitted a proposal to Washington through Qatar, which the US was reviewing. Iran has demanded an end to US sanctions and its naval blockade as conditions for resuming negotiations.

Russia has backed a diplomatic settlement. President Vladimir Putin met Iranian security chief Mohsen Rezaei on Thursday to discuss the conflict and regional security.

The International Monetary Fund wants to raise the utility bills of household consumers, but can they afford them?

Ukraine faces a difficult choice as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) pushes for higher household tariffs on gas, electricity and heating from 2027.

With utility arrears already reaching 113.4 billion hryvnia ($2.5 billion) and millions of households struggling to pay their existing bills, the proposed increases raise a fundamental question: if Ukrainians cannot afford current tariffs, who will pay the higher ones - and will the policy actually generate more revenue, or simply deepen household debt?

As of the beginning of 2026, outstanding utilities arrears amounted to 113.4 billion hryvnia ($2.5 billion), having increased by 12.5% in the fourth quarter of 2025, according to the State Statistics Service of Ukraine. The figures for heating and hot water are particularly revealing: payments covered only 59% of the amounts billed during that quarter.

Enforcement proceedings against delinquent households have soared, however, a large proportion of them end without debt recovery. Though no reason is offered, it can be assumed that many people simply cannot pay.

But that raises a question that the IMF doesn’t seem to address. If people cannot pay their existing bills, what makes anybody think that increasing the amount they owe will increase the amount of money collected?

The IMF’s tariff calculations are principally concerned with the relationship between the amount billed and the cost of supplying the service. But raising prices does not necessarily raise revenue proportionately.

Meanwhile, the huge sum of unpaid utility bills tells us something that standard economic statistics do not. It shows that households are continuing to consume an essential service without paying its full cost.

The utility company supplies the energy and sends the bill, but some of that bill goes unpaid. The household gets to use the money it would otherwise have spent on the utility bill, while the utility company is left waiting for payment. In effect, the company is extending credit to the household, whether it intends to or not.

There is an interesting economic implication here: some household consumption is being sustained not by income, but by the accumulation of unpaid bills.

The IMF is not a national economic planning ministry. It has a very particular mandate, which is to help countries address balance-of-payments problems and make financing available under certain safeguards – and of course promote economic stability.

For a country such as Ukraine, which is heavily dependent on external financial support, these objectives make a certain amount of sense. So does the IMF’s concern about the hidden degradation of Ukraine’s debt sustainability. A country’s ability to pay back creditors – including the IMF itself – is of no small concern to the fund.

But the IMF’s notion of “economic stability” usually has a way of becoming indistinguishable from “financial stability” and, once so interpreted, becomes defined in such a way that the interests of creditors are protected. Also, “financial stability” and “household economic stability” are not the same thing.

Nevertheless, the IMF is clearly correct that Ukraine has an unsustainable fiscal structure and that something has to give.

In September, Rada Energy Committee member Sergey Nagorniak said Ukraine would soon face tough decisions: “Sooner or later, our partners will back us into a corner and force us to make highly unpopular decisions – to end subsidies for natural gas, heating, and electricity tariffs for households,” the MP said.

Therefore, the age-old question of who will bear the burden of the adjustment cannot be avoided. Ultimately, this is a decision for the Ukrainian government. Insofar as it has any autonomy, it will have to decide what its priorities are.

What is clear enough is that the incentives seem to align so that the IMF, Ukraine’s creditors, and foreign donors are interested in maintaining a very specific type of stability, in which the wellbeing of Ukrainian households is far from the main concern.