the court of cassation in ankara on thursday approved an earlier sentence against canan kaftancioglu the leader of the istanbul branch of the republican peoples party chp she was sentenced to four years and 11 months in prison on charges of insulting the turkish republic and defamation of a public official in connection with her socialmedia posts some of which dated to 2013 she will also be banned from participating in politics for nearly five years about 14 million ukrainians have been forced from their homesincluding more than six million who have fled the countryand at least 3496 civilians have been killed since russia began its invasion united nations officials said the number of people uprooted by the fighting amounts to nearly onethird of ukraines prewar population of 44 million most of those seeking refuge outside of ukraine are women children or the elderly because wartime legislation prevents most men of fighting age from leaving the senate confirmed federal reserve chairman jerome powell to a second fouryear term that is shaping up to be every bit as trying as his first term as the central bank faces the highest inflation in 40 years mr powells nomination approved thursday on an 8019 vote has been on track for months to win bipartisan approval despite unease over inflation and aggressive interestrate increases that the fed has urgently commenced to cool price pressures bank of japan will stick to easy monetary policy gov kuroda says tokyobank of japan gov haruhiko kuroda reiterated friday that the central bank would stick to its monetary easing program as the nations economy is still recovering from the impact of the pandemic while the inflation rate is expected to rise to around 2 in the short run this will be driven by energy prices and lack sustainability mr kuroda said in a speech the bank therefore does not consider that scaling back the current monetary easing is appropriate hong kongs de facto central bank said it sold another us365 million to buy hong kong dollars during new york hours thursday the third time it has acted this week to defend the citys longstanding dollar peg the hong kong monetary authority had now sold about us109 billion this week to stop the local currency trading beyond the weak end of its permitted range of 775 to 785 hong kong dollars per us dollar washingtonthe democratic and republican leaders of the senate tried to fast track a nearly 40 billion us aid package to help ukraine in its fight against russia only to be blocked by republican sen rand paul of kentucky pushing passage of the bill into next week senate majority leader chuck schumer d ny and minority leader mitch mcconnell r ky came to the chamber floor together to request unanimous agreement from all 100 senators to allow a vote on the bill immediately crash of terrausd shakes crypto there was a run on the bank the cryptocurrency terrausd had one job maintain its value at 1 per coin since it launched in 2020 it had mostly done that rarely straying more than a fraction of a penny from its intended price that made it an island of stability a place where traders and investors could stash their funds in between forays into the otherwise frenzied crypto market seoulnorth korea reported its first death from a covid19 outbreak that it said for the first time had rapidly spread throughout the country more than 350000 people contracted a fever that explosively spread nationwide from late april and 187800 are currently being isolated and treated pyongyangs state media said friday the report said six people have died and one tested positive for the ba2 omicron variant it didnt say whether the other people who died were tested washingtonthe biden administration canceled plans to auction drilling rights in three regions off the us coastline later this year adding more friction to an uneasy relationship with the oil industry during a period of high gasoline prices the decision to cancel lease sales for two regions in the gulf of mexico and one off the coast of alaska leaves oilandgas companies facing a blackout period of unknown length for access to new drilling spots in valuable offshore acreage write to us at newslettersdowjonescom we offer an enhanced version of this briefing that is optimized for viewing on mobile devices and sent directly to your email inbox if you would like to sign up please go to httpsnewspluswsjcomsubscriptions this article is a text version of a wall street journal newsletter published earlier today