Turkey halted the transit of Western-sanctioned goods to Russia this month after a year of war in Ukraine and mounting US and European pressure on Ankara for action, a top export official and a diplomat said. A European Union official told Reuters that Ankara had given the European Commission verbal assurance that from 1 March goods would not transit onward to Russia if they are covered by EU, US or UK sanctions and export controls. Reuters reported last week that Russian companies have flooded Kazakh partners in recent weeks with new requests for some of the thousands of items banned by the West, with two of the sources citing new Turkish restrictions