MEZIESBLOG

Foreign diplomats in Russia have laid flowers at the site of last week’s attack on a suburban Moscow concert hall that killed 144 people.

Those in attendance included British deputy head of mission to Russia Tom Dodd and representatives of the US, countries in the EU, Africa and Latin America.

Russian state news agency RIA Novosti noted that the attendees included representatives of “unfriendly states”.

Russian state news agency TASS reported today that the number of people wounded in the attack was 551, quoting figures from the Moscow regional department of the Russian emergency situations ministry.

The death toll rose to 144 on Friday when a severely injured victim died in hospital, according to Russian health minister Mikhail Murashko.

Some EU clients refusing to buy products made of Russian metal

Russia’s Nornickel, the world’s largest palladium producer and a major producer of high-grade nickel, has said that some clients in the EU have refused to buy products made with Russian metals.

Although Nornickel itself and its metals is not a target of Western sanctions some consumers are voluntarily shunning deals for its metals and of products made from Russian raw materials, Anton Berlin, vice president for sales, said.

Nornickel’s Finnish Harjavalta plant, which produces battery materials in Europe for electric vehicles, was affected, he added as an example of the rejection of products made from Russian materials.

CEO Vladimir Potanin said last year that sanctions had constrained Nornickel’s development due to “voluntary self sanctions” imposed by some clients and foreign suppliers of equipment and technologies.