A Norwegian Cruise Line ship struck a small iceberg near Alaska over the weekend, ending its voyage prematurely.

While traveling through dense fog Saturday on its way to Hubbard Glacier in Alaska, the ship hit a growler — a small iceberg with 3.3 feet showing above the water and that is less than 6.6 feet across, according to USA Today.

The New York Post reported that one passenger estimated that the iceberg was roughly the size of a semi-truck.

The ship wound up docking at Juneau, where divers determined that the ship was damaged enough that it had to return to Seattle for repairs, per the Post.

No one was injured by the collision.

Everyone on board is getting a refund for the abridged trip, which may be a minor consolation prize for one family of seven. The Post said they had set out on the cruise after having postponed it for three years due to COVID-19.

Stewart Chiron, a cruise industry expert referenced by USA Today, said it is “extraordinarily rare” for ships to hit icebergs. In particular, it’s rare for a ship to have to amend its plans and check for damage because of a collision with an iceberg.

Russian armed forces are “increasingly hollowed out” after months of intense combat since late February when President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine, British military officials said Tuesday.

“They currently accept a level of degraded combat effectiveness which is probably unsustainable in the long term,” the UK’s Defense Intelligence tweeted.

Moscow has recently fielded the core elements of six different armies in its latest campaign but has achieved only “tactical success” at Sieverodonetsk in the disputed Donbas region. To make up for a large number of casualties, Russian officials have been forced to call up reservists and reportedly return retired army officers to active duty.

“Ukrainian forces continue to consolidate their positions on higher ground in the city of Lysychansk after falling back from Sieverodonetsk,” British officials said. “Ukrainian forces continue to disrupt Russian command and control with successful strikes deep behind Russian lines.”

Over the weekend, Russia launched what British officials called “unusually intense waves of strikes across Ukraine” using long-range fires — most likely including the Soviet-era AS-4 KITCHEN and more modern AS-23a KODIAK missiles. They were fired from Russian and Belarusian airspace. 

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The man considered to be the wealthiest oligarch in Russia, who has been photographed playing ice hockey with President Vladimir Putin, joins a growing list of those transferring – or, sailing – their prized assets to Dubai as the West tightens its massive sanctions program on Russia’s economy.

Vladimir Potanin, head of the world’s largest refined nickel and palladium producer, may not be sanctioned by the United States or Europe yet; such sanctions could roil metal markets and potentially disrupt supply chains, experts say. As the biggest shareholder in mining company Nornickel, Potanin had a personal fortune of $30.6 billion before the war on Ukraine, according to Forbes.

But like an increasing number of blacklisted Russian oligarchs, he has apparently taken the precaution of moving his $300 million superyacht to the safe haven of Dubai, in the U.S.-allied United Arab Emirates.

It is called the Nirvana, and the sleek 88-meter-long (289-foot-long) superyacht, equipped with a glass elevator, gym, hot tub, 3D cinema and two terrariums of exotic reptiles, stands out even in a port full of flashy, floating mansions.

The giant Dutch-built vessel with a navy blue hull was docked on Tuesday flying the flag of the Cayman Islands when Associated Press journalists observed the ship at Dubai’s Port Rashid – in the eyeshot of sanctioned Russian parliamentarian Andrei Skoch’s $156 million Madame Gu.

The arrival of Russian-owned luxury vessels in Dubai has become an outsized symbol of the UAE’s reluctance to oppose Moscow’s war on Ukraine and enforce Western sanctions. One of a shrinking number of countries where Russians can still fly directly, the financial center has become a thriving hub for Russia’s rich, in part because of its reputation for welcoming money from anywhere – both legitimate and shady.

“They haven’t tried to hide the fact they’re accepting oligarchs themselves and their yachts,” said Julia Friedlander, a former senior policy adviser for Europe in the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence. “When it comes to taking sides in the conflict, it’s not in their political interest to do so. They want to keep their access to money from around the world.”

The UAE Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Emirati stance has stoked tensions with the United States, which has sought to pressure its Gulf Arab ally to help combat Russian sanctions evasion. Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo, one of the main U.S. coordinators on the Russian sanctions strategy, visited the UAE last week to voice American concerns about Russian financial flows and demand increased vigilance.

Still, there’s no indication that President Joe Biden will impose secondary sanctions, leaving Washington with few pressure points.

As Moscow’s war on Ukraine grinds on, Western economic sanctions have proliferated in an effort to pressure Putin to change course. The European Union has captured billions of dollars in art, yachts and property. Britain, Fiji, Italy, Spain and other countries have impounded oligarchs’ yachts. The U.S. has seized vessels and aircraft.

Some prominent oligarchs, however, have escaped the blacklist because of their strategic holdings. Although Potanin has been hit with Canadian and Australian sanctions for his close ties to the Kremlin, his reputation as the “King of Nickel” has so far spared him.

“We’re reaching a critical metal shortage and we don’t know where those supply chains are headed, so you have to ask, would sanctioning him make things worse?” Friedlander said. “Those are serious considerations.”

President Biden sought Sunday to rally America’s major allies to stay unified against Russia’s war in Ukraine while also announcing a new global infrastructure investment partnership among several of the world’s largest U.S.-aligned economies to counter China’s rising influence over Africa, Asia and Latin America.

The infrastructure investment partnership, which has already drawn criticism for being a rehash of past initiatives that have struggled to gain global traction, was the centerpiece of opening meetings of the annual Group of Seven (G-7) leaders summit occurring this week in Germany.

Mr. Biden, who appeared Sunday in the Bavarian Alps alongside German, French, British, Canadian, Italian and Japanese counterparts, said the investment partnership will “mobilize” $600 billion in “public and private capital” from the G-7 countries for projects that will show developing nations around the world “the concrete benefits of partnering with democracies.”

The dollar figure is higher than anything previously announced by Western powers to counter the hundreds of billions China has doled out in infrastructure loans globally over the past decade.

Still, Sunday’s announcement risked being overshadowed by the more immediate crisis stemming from Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine.

Aides said much of the behind-the-scenes action at the G-7 so far has focused on preventing economic fallout from the Ukraine war that could fracture the global coalition currently imposing sanctions on Russia.

SEE ALSO: As U.S. troops reach 100k in Europe, questions mount over endgame, long-term effects

Concerns about the coalition have grown in recent weeks amid fears Moscow could spark a widening energy crisis by cutting natural gas flows to Europe.

“We’ve got to make sure we have us all staying together,” Mr. Biden said during an initial round of public remarks Sunday after a pre-summit sit-down with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who holds the G-7′s rotating presidency and is hosting the gathering at Elmau Castle.

“You know, we’re gonna continue working on economic challenges that we face, but I think we get through all this,” the president said.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called on other G-7 leaders not to give in to “fatigue” over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, even as Moscow appeared to be trying to preempt the summit and a major NATO leaders gathering slated to occur later in the coming week by increasing the pace of attacks in Ukraine.

Russian forces unleashed a barrage of missile strikes through the weekend in Ukraine, with the G-7 countries responding by announcing plans to impose a ban on gold from Russia.

A formal announcement on the gold ban is expected to occur by Tuesday before the G-7 leaders wrap their summit ahead of the NATO gathering, which begins Wednesday in Madrid.

SEE ALSO: Ukrainian fighter pilots in Washington to appeal in person for advanced aircraft for war effort

Mr. Biden is slated to attend the NATO summit, at which Ukraine is expected to take center stage alongside discussions of Finland and Sweden joining the alliance, despite ongoing resistance to their bid by Turkey.

In the interim, officials noted Sunday that gold is Russia’s second-biggest export after energy, asserting that banning imports would make it more difficult for Moscow to participate in global markets.

Mr. Johnson said the ban will “directly hit Russian oligarchs and strike at the heart of Putin’s war machine.”

“Putin is squandering his dwindling resources on this pointless and barbaric war. He is bankrolling his ego at the expense of both the Ukrainian and Russian people,” the British prime minister said. “We need to starve the Putin regime of its funding.”

Rebranding ‘B3W’

The U.S. and fellow democracies have been trying for the past several years to come up with an effective economic strategy for countering the rising influence had with governments across much of the developing world by China and the ruling communist party in Beijing.

The G-7 partnership announced Sunday responses to China’s so-called Belt and Road Initiative, which Western officials have argued fosters autocracies in the developing world.

The former Trump administration in Washington often criticized the Chinese program as “predatory,” with the goal of burdening economically weaker nations with debt that might later be relieved in exchange for Chinese government access to natural resources and other forms of influence.

But U.S. officials have struggled to offer concrete alternatives. The Trump administration ushered in reforms that included the creation of the U.S. International Development Finance Corp., backed with $60 billion to inspire private investment in developing countries worldwide.

Mr. Biden has tried to expand the approach via the G-7, announcing the so-called “Build Back Better World” (B3W) initiative at last year’s summit to try to inspire private investment from wealthy democratic countries toward infrastructure and other needs in the developing world.

Sunday’s announcement was largely a reframing of the B3W initiative under a different name and it remains to be seen whether the president has the geopolitical capital to steer the initiative toward tangible results.

Mr. Biden vowed that the U.S. will “mobilize $200 billion in public and private capital over the next five years” for the new initiative, now formally called the “Partnership for Global Infrastructure.”

The president said the partnership will steer money toward areas “critical to sustainable development and to our shared global stability: health and health security, digital connectivity, gender equality and equity, climate and energy security.”

Among the first initiatives are a $2 billion solar farm investment in Angola in Southwest Africa, $320 million for hospital construction in Ivory Coast in West Africa, and $40 million to promote regional energy trade in Southeast Asia.

Mr. Biden claimed some $335 million in private capital is being mobilized to supply secure network equipment in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. He also said the U.S. government has supported the successful bid by an American company, SubCom, for a $600 million contract to build a global subsea telecommunications cable.

“This cable will stretch from Southeast Asia, through the Middle East and the Horn of Africa, to Europe,” the president said. “This will be essential to meeting the growing demand for reliable security, high-tech connectivity in three key regions of the world.”

Promising billions

The administration has done little to specify how it will inspire investments worth hundreds of billions of dollars from private corporations.

Some analysts are skeptical that the U.S. appeal for private sector money from American and G-7 companies will yield substantial results.

“The re-pitch of U.S. engagement on infrastructure is valiant but faces two big challenges,” says Satu Limaye, who heads the Washington office of the East-West Center and the Asia Matters for America initiative.

“U.S. private money has lots of places to seek returns, and infrastructure abroad does not so far appear to be very attractive,” Mr. Limaye told The Washington Times. “Part of the reason it is not attractive is that countries who seek major spending on infrastructure are hardly paragons for private sector investment attractiveness in the infrastructure space.”

Despite such concerns, Mr. Biden appeared to be in full pitch mode Sunday, presenting the new G-7 infrastructure investment partnership as a money maker for everyone involved.

“I want to be clear: This isn’t aid or charity; it’s an investment that will deliver returns for everyone, including the American people and the people of all our nations,” the president said in Germany. “It’ll boost all of our economies, and it’s a chance for us to share our positive vision for the future.”

Mr. Biden seemed to avoid framing the initiative as an effort to contain China, apparently out of concern that doing so might make the G-7 appear to be on the defensive globally.

However, the president’s top aides have made it clear that the new investment partnership is all about countering China.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told an event early this month at the Center for a New American Security think tank in Washington that the G-7 initiative centers on growing “global infrastructure — physical, health and digital infrastructure that we think can provide an alternative to what the Chinese are offering.”

While the president avoided mentioning China by name in his own remarks on Sunday, he stressed that the investment partnership centers on democracies supporting each other.

“When democracies demonstrate what we can do, all that we have to offer, I have no doubt that we’ll win the competition every time,” Mr. Biden said.

The number of American troops in Europe has risen sharply in the four months since Russia invaded Ukraine, jumping from about 65,000 in mid-February to 100,000 today.

But that increase, one of the most rapid U.S. military build-ups on the continent in the post-Cold War era, comes without a clear end date or any obvious metrics to determine when troops could come home or be repositioned to other key theaters such as the Indo-Pacific.

Instead, their mission is to deter further Russian aggression and prevent any attack on NATO territory — a goal that will prove difficult to measure and one that could potentially justify a years-long mission as Russia and Ukraine settle into a slow, bloody war of attrition in the Donbas.

The long-term consequences for the U.S. and its foreign policy priorities could be significant, some foreign policy analysts argue, as Washington likely can’t afford to keep up such troop levels in Europe over the long haul without sacrificing resources in the Pacific.

They say that the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s not-so-subtle threats toward Europe, should spark a renewed push inside NATO and the European Union to ramp up member nations’ defense spending and troop deployments on their own borders.

“We did what we had to do in the short term, following the February invasion, to deter an attack against NATO members,” said Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a Washington think tank. “Unfortunately we have no idea how long this lasts. I think we can make a reasonable guess that what’s going on in Ukraine could go on for a very long time.”

SEE ALSO: G7 to ban Russian gold, as missile strikes continue in Ukraine

“I don’t want to send more forces than we need to Europe because they’re needed in the Indo-Pacific,” Mr. Bowman said. “We really need Europe to step up as much as possible to take the security burden off of our forces that are there as much as possible so we can allocate more of our finite resources elsewhere.”

Mr. Bowman conceded, however, that if the choice is between a ramped-up U.S. presence or inadequate protection for NATO’s eastern flank, “I choose to send U.S. forces.”

Those questions will be at the center of both public and private conversations this week when NATO members meet for a high-stakes summit in Madrid.

The debate over America’s long-term military presence in Europe has long been a politically divisive issue. It famously formed a cornerstone of former President Donald Trump’s foreign policy, as he relentlessly pushed European nations to spend more on their own security and remove some of the burden from the U.S.

His push was somewhat successful, as numerous NATO members increased annual defense spending past 2% of GDP, which has become the widely accepted target figure.

Mr. Trump’s effort to pull thousands of U.S. forces from Germany, however, was abandoned after President Biden came to power in January 2021.

SEE ALSO: Ukrainian fighter pilots in Washington to appeal in person for advanced aircraft for war effort

‘It’s their backyard’

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has sparked more defense spending increases, but even European leaders acknowledge that they’ve been too slow to bolster their militaries.

The figures are somewhat stunning, especially compared with the eye-popping defense spending increases seen in Moscow and Beijing.

From 1999 to 2021, EU combined defense spending increased by 20%, the European Commission said in a May 18 analysis. During that same time, defense spending increased by 66% in the U.S., 292% in Russia and a whopping 592% in China.

“Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has changed the security landscape in Europe. Many are increasing their defense spending, but it is crucial that member states invest better together to prevent further fragmentation and address existing shortfalls,” top EU diplomat Josep Borrell said in a statement accompanying that May 18 document. “If we want modern and interoperable European armed forces, we need to act now.”

In 2020, total EU defense spending amounted to 1.3% of the alliance’s GDP, according to European Commission figures. Key European nations — including Germany and Poland — have ramped up their defense budgets in the months since the war in Ukraine began. They’ve pledged to increase them further in the future.

But in the short term, there’s no clear substitute for American manpower, weapons and equipment in Europe, particularly in Poland and the Baltic states closest to the raging war in Ukraine.

The Pentagon so far has largely sidestepped questions about how long the current level of U.S. troops will be maintained in Europe, stressing that they’re there to deter Russian aggression and to demonstrate NATO solidarity.

Military analysts stress that such deterrence is crucial both for the security of Europe and for America’s long-term foreign policy challenges beyond the continent.

“To the extent China is seen as a major challenge, it is all the more reason that European security must be stabilized as an anchor of the future global order,” Michael O’Hanlon, senior fellow and director of research in foreign policy at the Brookings Institution, wrote in a June 21 analysis of U.S. and NATO defense postures in Europe.

“The United States and allies do not have the military, economic, or diplomatic bandwidth to address escalating crises and conflict in both Europe and Asia at the same time,” Mr. O’Hanlon wrote. “New crises and conflicts in Europe must be prevented before they begin, to the maximum extent possible.”

The twin dynamics in Europe and the Pacific will require close collaboration between the U.S. and its NATO allies, specialists say, in order to achieve maximum impact.

While some major European military players such as Britain and France are increasing their presence in the Pacific, others should focus almost entirely on Europe in order to take pressure off of U.S. forces, specialists argue.

“I really don’t need German vessels sailing through the Taiwan Strait,” said Mr. Bowman, the FDD analyst. “What do we need to defend Europe? We need air defense. We need long-range fires. We need [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance]. Armored forces deter aggression along our flank. I’d like the Europeans to provide that as much as possible. It’s their backyard. If they don’t, we should. But we should be banging on them behind closed doors as much as possible to do it.”

Of the 100,000 U.S. troops in Europe, more than a third are on rotational deployment, meaning those service members are expected to remain on the continent for under a year.

“Prior to the unprovoked Russian invasion in Ukraine, there were approximately 65,000 permanently assigned U.S. service members in European Command,” U.S. European Command told The Washington Times in a statement. “There are currently 100,000 U.S. service members in the region. That includes approximately 35,000 scheduled rotational forces and additional forces ordered to the region by Secretary of Defense [Lloyd] Austin.”

Russia is poised to default on its foreign debt for the first time since the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, further alienating the country from the global financial system following sanctions imposed over its war in Ukraine.

The country faces a Sunday night deadline to meet a 30-day grace period on interest payments originally due May 27. But it could take time to confirm a default.

“While there is a possibility that some magic could occur” and Russia gets the money through financial institutions to bondholders despite sanctions, “nobody’s making that bet,” said Jay S. Auslander, a top sovereign debt lawyer at the firm of Wilk Auslander in New York. “The overwhelming probability is they won’t be able to because no bank is going to move the money.”

Last month, the U.S. Treasury Department ended Russia‘s ability to pay its billions in debt back to international investors through American banks. In response, the Russian Finance Ministry said it would pay dollar-denominated debts in rubles and offer “the opportunity for subsequent conversion into the original currency.”

Russia calls any default artificial because it has the money to pay its debts but says sanctions have frozen its foreign currency reserves held abroad.

“There is money and there is also the readiness to pay,” Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said last month. “This situation, artificially created by an unfriendly country, will not have any effect on Russians’ quality of life.”

Tim Ash, senior emerging market sovereign analyst at BlueBay Asset Management, tweeted that the default “is clearly not” beyond Russia‘s control and that sanctions are preventing it from paying its debts because it invaded Ukraine.

Here are key things to know about a Russian default:

HOW MUCH DOES RUSSIA OWE?

About $40 billion in foreign bonds, about half of that to foreigners. Before the start of the war, Russia had around $640 billion in foreign currency and gold reserves, much of which was held overseas and is now frozen.

Russia has not defaulted on its international debts since the Bolshevik Revolution more than a century ago, when the Russian Empire collapsed and the Soviet Union was created. Russia defaulted on its domestic debts in the late 1990s but was able to recover from that default with the help of international aid.

Investors have expected Russia to default for months. Insurance contracts that cover Russian debt have priced a 80% likelihood of default for weeks, and rating agencies like Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s have placed the country’s debt deep into junk territory.

HOW DO YOU KNOW IF A COUNTRY IS IN DEFAULT?

Ratings agencies can lower the rating to default or a court can decide the issue. Bondholders who have credit default swaps – contracts that act like insurance policies against default – can ask a committee of financial firm representatives to decide whether a failure to pay debt should trigger a payout, which still isn’t a formal declaration of default.

The Credit Default Determination Committee – an industry group of banks and investment funds – ruled June 7 that Russia had failed to pay required additional interest after making a payment on a bond after the April 4 due date. But the committee put off taking further action due to uncertainty over how sanctions might affect any settlement.

WHAT CAN INVESTORS DO?

The formal way to declare default is if 25% or more of bondholders say they didn’t get their money. Once that happens, provisions say all Russia’s other foreign bonds are also in default, and bondholders could then seek a court judgment to enforce payment.

In normal circumstances, investors and the defaulting government typically negotiate a settlement in which bondholders are given new bonds that are worth less but that at least give them some partial compensation.

But sanctions bar dealings with Russia’s finance ministry. And no one knows when the war will end or how much defaulted bonds could wind up being worth.

In this case, declaring default and suing “might not be the wisest choice,” Auslander said. It’s not possible to negotiate with Russia and there are so many unknowns, so creditors may decide to “hang tight for now.”

Investors who wanted out of Russian debt have probably already headed for the exits, leaving those who may have bought bonds at knocked-down prices in hopes of profiting from a settlement in the long run. And they might want to keep a low profile for a while to avoid being associated with the war.

Once a country defaults, it can be cut off from bond-market borrowing until the default is sorted out and investors regain confidence in the government’s ability and willingness to pay. But Russia has already been cut off from Western capital markets, so any return to borrowing is a long way off anyway.

The Kremlin can still borrow rubles at home, where it mostly relies on Russian banks to buy its bonds.

WHAT WOULD BE THE IMPACT OF RUSSIA‘S DEFAULT?

Western sanctions over the war have sent foreign companies fleeing from Russia and interrupted the country’s trade and financial ties with the rest of the world. Default would be one more symptom of that isolation and disruption.

Investment analysts are cautiously reckoning that a Russia default would not have the kind of impact on global financial markets and institutions that came from an earlier default in 1998. Back then, Russia’s default on domestic ruble bonds led the U.S. government to step in and get banks to bail out Long-Term Capital Management, a large U.S. hedge fund whose collapse, it was feared, could have shaken the wider financial and banking system.

Holders of the bonds – for instance, funds that invest in emerging market bonds – could take serious losses. Russia, however, played only a small role in emerging market bond indexes, limiting the losses to fund investors.

While the war itself is having devastating consequences in terms of human suffering and higher food and energy prices worldwide, default on government bonds would be “definitely not systemically relevant,” International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva has said.

OSLO, Norway — Norwegian police say two people have been killed and more than a dozen injured in a mass shooting in Oslo.

The shooting happened early Saturday outside a bar in the downtown area of the Norwegian capital, police said.

A suspect has been arrested, police spokesman Tore Barstad said. The motive was not immediately known.