Staunton, January 25 -Russian actions at the Donetsk airport last week and in Mariupol January 24 show that “except for military blackmail and murders, Putin has nothing to offer either Western leaders or Ukraine,” a conclusion that Vitaly Portnikov argues should compel both to re-examine their willingness to negotiate with him. Ukraine’s defensive actions need […]
Staunton, December 6 – Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and the failure of the West so far to repel it has a longer-term consequence that few are prepared to face: The Kremlin leader’s actions will lead ever more countries to seek to build or otherwise acquire nuclear weapons as the only reliable means of self-defense. […]
Staunton, November 21 – On the first anniversary of the beginning of the Maidan demonstrations, Vitaly Portnikov says, it is important to understand that “Putin lost Ukraine even before the Maidan, before the dispersal of the students, before the bloodshed, before the occupation or Crimea and before the war in the Donbass.” He lost it, […]
Staunton, November 19 – Faced with a united front in the West, Andrey Piontkovsky says, Putin may seek “to freeze the Ukrainian conflict and then to save face as a patriot of ‘the Russian world’ decide to take certain steps in the Caucasus as he is doing now,” something that threatens all three of the […]
Staunton, November 1 – “A Ukrainian political nation has been formed,” Vitaly Portnikov says, something that has been noticed not only by those “who love and support it” but also by “those who hate it.” As a result, on the post-Soviet space, it has become “a synonym for a free individual,” and its hymn “the […]
Staunton, October 17 – Now that Aleksey Navalny has said that he won’t return Crimea to Ukraine and Mikhail Khodorkovsky has added that “only a [Russian] dictator” could do so, other “representatives of Russian democratic society have hastened” to assure Russians that they won’t either as they live in “a democracy” in which “all issues […]
Staunton, September 11 – Despite a hard-won and well-deserved reputation for being able to outsmart Western leaders in pursuit of his goals, Vladimir Putin, as a result of his own recent actions, has left himself with only bad options for his next move in Ukraine, according to Vitaly Portnikov. In a commentary on Liga.net, the […]
Staunton, September 5 – From the very first moments of Vladimir Putin’s aggression against Ukraine, “optimists” in Russia and the West have deceived themselves and others and helped set the stage for Putin to go further, a pattern that shows no signs of abating anytime soon, according to Vitaly Portnikov. On the Grani.ru portal, the […]
Staunton, August 29 – Given how often Vladimir Putin lies, it may be a mistake to make too much of any of his statements as an indication of where he is heading. But his use of the term “Novorossiya” in his statement yesterday, the first time he has talked about that space within Ukraine as […]
Staunton, July 18 – The shooting down of the Malaysian plane yesterday became practically inevitable, Vitaly Portnikov says, when Vladimir Putin gave the pro-Moscow secessionists “modern arms and a sense that they could not be punished” because they enjoyed the Kremlin’s backing. In a Grani.ru commentary today, Portnikov says that Putin extended that sense of […]
