G7 nations have banned all future Russian gold imports with the goal of depriving the Kremlin's war chest of tens of billions of dollars.

An investigation traced phosphate shipments from the desert mines of Syria to Europe’s fertilizer factories, using open source analysis and financial documents and trade data from dozens of countries.

Tensions between Russia and NATO are already heightened as a result of the war in Ukraine and the move by Lithuania has ratcheted those up further, potentially putting a NATO country (and the entire alliance) in line for a direct confrontation with Russia.