The war initiated by Russia against Ukraine and the resulting anti-Russian sanctions pushed the Russian government budget into its deepest deficit in the first month of 2023 in more than a decade, The Wall Street Journal reports referring to the data from the Russian Ministry of Finance.
The numbers show that Russia’s oil and gas revenues nearly halved, dropping 46% in January from the same month last year, while government spending, driven by military purchases, jumped by 59% from last January.