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• The Kremlin has worked aggressively to derail the EU deal by offering Kiev loans and price discounts, imposing painful trade sanctions and threatening Ukraine with giant gas bills. Ukraine has had to suffer through several cold winter spells when Russia tightened the tap during politically sensitive times.
• In a video released by the Lithuanian presidency, Yanukovych told German Chancellor Angela Merkel late Thursday that "the economic situation in Ukraine is very difficult," before adding some time later that "I have been one-on-one with Russia for three and a half years under very unequal conditions."
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• MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Mexican drug cartels looking to diversify their businesses long ago moved into oil theft, pirated goods, extortion and kidnapping, consuming an ever larger swath of the country's economy. This month, federal officials confirmed the cartels have even entered the country's lucrative mining industry, exporting iron ore to Chinese mills.
• Such large-scale illegal mining operations were long thought to be wild rumor, but federal officials confirmed they had known about the cartels' involvement in mining since 2010, and that the Nov. 4 military takeover of Lazaro Cardenas, Mexico's second-largest port, was aimed at cutting off the cartels' export trade.
• That news served as a wake-up call to Mexicans that drug traffickers have penetrated the country's economy at unheard-of levels, becoming true Mafia-style organizations.
• The Knights Templar cartel and its predecessor, the La Familia drug gang, have been stealing or extorting shipments of iron ore, or illegally extracting the mineral themselves and selling it through Pacific coast ports, said Michoacan residents, mining companies and current and former federal officials. The cartel had already imposed demands for "protection payments" on many in the state, including shopkeepers, ranchers and farmers.
• But so deeply entrenched was the cartel connection to mines, mills, ports, export firms and land holders that it took authorities three years to confront the phenomenon head-on. Federal officials said they are looking to crack down on other ports where drug gangs are operating.
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