3 things Putin probably hadn’t bargained for March 4, 2014 It seems Vladimir Putin, upon whom everyone’s been keeping more than half an eye, is backing off. Following the beating the Russian stock market and currency took yesterday, the Russian leader's been speaking at a news conference. He told reporters this morning that there’s no – current – need for military force in Ukraine, that [...]
Putin defends Gazprom price hikes on Ukraine March 4, 2014 Russian President Vladimir Putin has defended a planned price rises for Ukraine by state-owned Russian energy giant Gazprom. Speaking to a press conference President Putin said: They failed to pay off the debt, I think it's $1.5bn as of today, and if they don't pay for February it's going to be $2bn. So if you [...]
Putin: Armed troops in Ukraine are last resort March 4, 2014 President Putin, who’s currently speaking at a news conference, has said there’s no need to send troops into Ukraine now, but that Russia still "has that option". Deploying armed forces is, he said, would only be done in an extreme case. "So the tense situation in Crimea related to the possibility of use of force [...]
Bottom Line: Kiev is the key to Putin’s power March 3, 2014 IT’S NOT just about the Crimea. Attention has naturally turned to Russia’s immediate strategic interest in Sevastopol. But the assumption that this marks the limit of Vladimir Putin’s ambition is a dangerous miscalculation. Putin’s trademark brand of Russian nationalism makes control of Kiev non-negotiable. Without it he is just another thug. But for deep cultural [...]
Crimea checkmate: Putin now has his Ukraine veto March 2, 2014 US SECRETARY of state John Kerry tends to reveal more than he ought to. In response to the Russian takeover of Crimea, he blustered, “you just don’t in the twenty-first century behave in a nineteenth-century fashion by invading another country,” as though the laws of human nature and geopolitics have been recently improved upon. In [...]
Forget invasion: Putin is just four steps from victory in Ukraine February 27, 2014 AS ITS currency collapses, protests flare up in Crimea, and Russia flexes its muscles on the doorstep, those in the West claiming triumph in Ukraine should remember the story of King Pyrrhus of Epirus. In 279 BC, this scourge of the Romans managed to best them at the Battle of Asculum, but at tremendous cost. [...]
The grave crises facing Putin’s Russia lay bare its fundamental weaknesses January 28, 2014 CHAOS in Kiev must feel uncomfortably close to Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Ukrainian parliament yesterday annulled laws that sought to clear the streets of protesters against Ukraine’s increasingly authoritarian pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych. Ukraine’s prime minister and government have quit, and the country stands perilously on the edge of deeper conflict – prompted initially [...]