West is letting Putin get his way on Ukraine
Solutions should come from diplomatic, not military, action. Yet, there must be deterrence alongside diplomacy. There is a danger, however, that the West is so distracted by events in the Middle East that it ignores the angry Russian bear lashing out in Europe, which possibly poses the bigger threat to our immediate futures. Earlier this year, Russian activist Alexei Navalny proposed a list of Putin’s inner circle who should be subjected to sanctions; nearly all are now on the western blacklist, apart from the football oligarchs Roman Abramovich and Alisher Usmanov. It would send a powerful signal to see sanctions imposed on this pair, whatever the cost to their London clubs.