The Obama administration is sanctioning Russia's largest bank as part of a new round of financial penalties aimed at punishing Moscow for its support of separatists in Ukraine.

The U.S. is also expanding sanctions targeting Russia's energy and defense sectors. The U.S. penalties come hours after the European Union enacted its own sanctions on Russian banks, arms makers and the country's biggest oil company.

On Thursday, President Obama said the sanctions will increase Moscow's political isolation and 바카라사이트 - http://www.oak-creek-club.com/jordan5forsale.html foist additional economic costs on the country.

"I have said from the very beginning of this crisis that we want to see a negotiated political solution that respects Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity," the president explained in a statement. "Together with G-7 and European partners and our other Allies, we have made clear that we are prepared to impose mounting costs on Russia. We are implementing these new measures in light of Russia's actions to further destabilize Ukraine over the last month, including through the presence of heavily armed Russian forces in eastern Ukraine."

Friday's penalties prohibit persons - http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/persons in the U.S. from providing equity or debt financing of longer than 30 days to Sberbank of Russia. The bank is Russia's largest financial institution and accounts for approximately one-quarter of Russian banking assets and one-third of its banking capital, according to the Obama administration.

The Ukrainian government and the pro-Russian separatists recently reached a cease-fire agreement, but Mr. Obama has expressed skepticism that it will hold.

"The only reason we're seeing this cease-fire at the moment is because of the sanctions that have already been applied and the threat of further sanctions," Mr. Obama said from the NATO Summit in Wales last week.

After delivering powerful performances on Memorial Day, the singers of "The Voice" returned Tuesday to find out which two of them would be eliminated.

Shakira and Usher came into this week with just one singer remaining on each of their teams. By the end of the night, they could have been out of the competition completely.

As it turned out, both of them are still in the game. Team Shakira's Sasha Allen and Team Usher's Michelle - http://www.foxnews.com/search-results/search?q=Michelle Chamuel were both deemed safe.

Adam Levine wasn't as lucky. Both of the night's eliminated - http://www.dict.cc/englisch-deutsch/night%27s%20eliminated.html singers -- Judith Hill and Sarah Simmons -- were on his team. Hill and Simmons were strong contenders from the start, so their ousting came as a surprise to many, including their coach.

The results mean that Levine joins Shakira and Usher in the one-singer-left club (his remaining singer is Amber Carrington), while Blake Shelton still has three contestants (Danielle Bradbery, Holly Tucker and the Swon Brothers) on his team.

The top six will return Monday for another set of performances.

Tell us: 카지노사이트 - http://ccot.edu.vn/ Were you surprised by Tuesday's elimination results? Did the right singers go home?

Does a youth misspent lounging and lazing condemn middle-aged folks to a future of bad heart health?

Maybe not, a new, small study has found.

People in their 50s and early 60s can regain the heart health of someone decades younger through a regular and reasonable aerobic exercise program, no matter how long they've been inactive, the study authors said.

Middle-aged couch potatoes who worked out four or five days a week -- including a couple of days of high-intensity aerobics -- for two years experienced a notable decrease in the stiffness of their heart muscle, the researchers found.

A more flexible heart means less risk of heart failure as one ages, explained lead researcher Dr. Benjamin Levine, founder and director of the Institute for Exercise and Environmental Medicine at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas.

"I was astounded at how well this seemed to improve the flexibility and compliance of the heart," Levine said. "The key to a healthier heart in middle age is the right dose of exercise at the right time in life."

A sedentary lifestyle in late middle age is known to increase the risk of heart failure by allowing the heart muscle to shrink and stiffen, the researchers said in background notes - http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/background%20notes .

What wasn't known is how late in life a person can act to reduce that risk, and how much effort this would require.

Earlier experiments showed that by the time men and women hit the 70s, intense exercise will do nothing to improve their heart health, Levine said. These studies also found that someone who only works out a couple times a week gains little when it comes to their heart.

"We found casual exercise, two or three days a week, was simply not enough to preserve the youthfulness of the structure of the heart," Levine said. "That doesn't mean it had no benefits, but it wasn't enough to preserve that youthful rubber-band-like compliance."

To see if a higher dose of exercise at a younger age would help, Levine and his colleagues recruited 61 people between the ages of 45 and 64 who were healthy but stuck in a low-energy sedentary lifestyle.

These volunteers were assigned to two different groups. One group engaged in two years of training that included four to five days of exercise each week, while the other group took part in regular yoga, balance training and weight-lifting workouts.

The researchers eased the exercise group into its routine during the first couple of months to avoid injury, Levine said, 카지노사이트 - http://atared.cl/wordpress/ but eventually the participants adopted a regular set of workouts that included:

The regimen also included two recovery days that followed interval training, consisting of 20 to 30 minutes of walking or light aerobic activity.

"People generally like interval sessions because they don't last as long," Levine said. "You can work out hard and then recover, and it feels really good."

The participants were encouraged to use lots of different exercise equipment (stationary bikes, treadmills, elliptical trainers) and engage in outdoor exercises (running and cycling) to keep themselves motivated and interested, Levine said.

After a while, all in the aerobics group transitioned to what Levine calls their weekly "maintenance dose" -- one high-intensity interval session, one long session, a couple of regular base-training sessions and a recovery day, along with some strength training.

Two years later, the exercise group had notably more youthful hearts than the control group that went without regular aerobic exercise, the researchers found.

"We've got the dose, four to five days a week. We've got the 'sweet spot' in age -- late middle age," Levine said. "We apparently now can reverse the effects of sedentary aging."

This program is specifically designed to be agreeable for middle-aged people who don't have the time or inclination - http://www.lifebeyondtourism.org/?header_search=inclination to adhere to the same sort of workout program as elite athletes, Levine said.

"It's my prescription for life," Levine said. "Exercise training needs to be part of your personal hygiene, like brushing your teeth or taking a shower or changing your clothes. You need to work it into your daily life."

Heart health expert Dr. Nieca Goldberg agreed that the program tested in this study is "a reasonable goal for most people."

"They can't think they're going to achieve this right out of the chair, but it is definitely doable," said Goldberg, medical director of the Women's Heart Program at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City.

Combining this program with a healthy diet, she said, "can only help as part of an overall heart disease prevention program."

The study, funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, was published online Jan. 8 in the journal Circulation.

DONETSK, Ukraine -- In the dead of night, Ukrainian troops and Russian-backed rebel forces on Friday exchanged 67 prisoners who had been captured during fighting in eastern Ukraine, part of a cease-fire deal that has struggled to succeed.

The transfer took place in the dark outside of the main rebel stronghold of Donetsk under the watch of international observers.

Thirty-six Ukrainian servicemen were released after negotiations, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said. Ukrainian forces handed over 31 pro-Russian rebels - http://www.blogrollcenter.com/index.php?a=search&q=pro-Russian%20rebels detained over the five-month conflict, some of them Russian citizens.

The cease-fire took effect a week ago but has been routinely violated. Shortly after the prisoner exchange, a volley of rocket fire was heard in Donetsk.

The Ukrainian servicemen were driven away from local rebel headquarters around 1:30 a.m. and taken several miles north of Donetsk, where they were met by Ukrainian military officials.

More in Ukraine in Turmoil

The two sets of captives were brought out wearing handcuffs, which were removed as they were handed over. One representative from each side checked - http://ms-jd.org/search/results/search&keywords=checked/ each prisoner against a list and crossed out their name as they were freed.

"There is an ongoing process of talks. We are meeting each other's demands and fulfilling our promises," said Yuriy Tandit, a negotiator for the government.

Darya Morozova, who is overseeing the prisoner exchange for the separatists, said she estimates around 1,200 rebels and their supporters are being detained by Ukrainian authorities. She said the rebels were holding several hundred Ukrainian troops, but when asked for an exact figure, she would only say it was "up to 1,000" people.

Morozova claimed the rebel prisoners had been poorly treated and some had not been fed for around two weeks. Another transfer of prisoners is expected in the next three days, she said.

Some of the separatists freed Friday were Russian citizens.

One of them, Simon Veridya from Moscow, said he was captured in the town of Kramatorsk, which was retaken by government forces in July.

"They shot at our ambulance. There were five of us, including two women. We were taken to custody in Kramatorsk" at the airport, Veridya said. "I was beaten and have two broken ribs."

The conflict between Russian-backed rebels and the Ukrainian government has been raging since mid-April, claiming more than 3,000 lives, 카지노사이트 - http://testemkt.buonny.com.br/mundolog/ according to the UN. Hundreds of thousands have been forced to flee the fighting.

Ukraine and the West have accused Russia of propping up the insurgency in eastern Ukraine with recruits and heavy weapons. Moscow has admitted that Russian volunteers were fighting across the border but denied sending the rebels weapons or troops.

The United States, meanwhile, announced a new round of sanctions against Russia on Friday for its actions in Ukraine.