The EU needs a coherent strategy on Russian sanctions
This week, the European Union opted to extend sanctions on some 1,800 Russian companies and individuals for another six months,…
Putin’s North Korea summit was pure theatre
If a little tyrant theatre is your goal, then rumbling across the border in an armoured train decked out like…
Why Putin is pointing the finger at Britain
Perfidious Albion is, we are told, at it again. In the course of a wide-ranging and often quite surreal speech…
Prigozhin’s death has exposed Putin’s weakness
So much is still unclear about the fate of Wagner group head Yevgeny Prigozhin, from whether he really did die…
Sanctions are failing to turn Putin’s oligarchs against him
When personal sanctions on Russian oligarchs and officials were imposed by the UK, US and EU after Putin’s invasion, the…
Why the Kremlin sees Britain as the ultimate bogeyman
Perfidious Albion is at it again. The Kremlin’s increasingly unhinged obsession with seeing a British hand behind its various upsets…
Was Putin behind the Electoral Commission hack?
The hacking of the Electoral Commission’s databases highlights the way that in the interconnected modern world, ‘warfare’ can be as…
Will MI6’s Russian recruitment drive work?
Sir Richard Moore, head of the Secret Intelligence Service – MI6 – follows the tradition of only giving one public…
Moscow’s Pyrrhic Nato victory
Despite the inevitable and performative expressions of anger, regret and dismay following this week’s Nato summit, Moscow feels it has…
Putin is struggling to solve his Prigozhin problem
It’s satisfying when a jigsaw piece slots into place. Today we heard that Wagner leader Evgeny Prigozhin met Vladimir Putin in the…
The Kremlin is trying to humiliate Prigozhin
When corrupt Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was toppled in 2014, his private estate at Mezhyhirya turned out to contain an…
After Putin: how nervous should we be?
The next generation is waiting for Putin to fall
Putin faces challenge from his own creation
It took a characteristically long time for Vladimir Putin to respond to the coup-that-dare-not-speak-its-name launched by Yevgeny Prigozhin, but when…
The Kremlin is still afraid of Alexei Navalny
As Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is once again in court, facing charges that could extend his time in prison…
Putin is lining up a lengthy list of scapegoats for his war
Lately Vladimir Putin has been strikingly unwilling to subject himself to any serious debate about his war in Ukraine. On…
Will Putin manage to spin Kyiv’s counter-offensive as a victory?
The Ukrainian counter-offensive has duly started and, needless to say, there is a rush to judgement. It is going to…
Russia flounders as Kyiv gears up for its counter-offensive
According to Moscow, Ukraine’s long-awaited counter-offensive has begun, and has begun badly for Kyiv. Of course, we need to treat…
Ukraine’s next move: can Putin be outsmarted?
Ukraine cannot afford to play it safe
Russia’s fake news machine has a fresh target
There is a certain perverse cachet in one’s words being wilfully distorted by someone who thinks it gives their argument…
Why has Ukraine admitted that it assassinates people in Russia?
After months of flat denials, the head of Ukrainian military intelligence has admitted that Kyiv is carrying out a campaign…
Prigozhin’s ‘treachery’ poses a dangerous challenge to Putin
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the businessman behind the Wagner mercenary army, likes accusing his political enemies of ‘treason’ for not backing him…
The Black Sea is Nato’s new front line against Russia
Earlier this month, an unarmed Polish aircraft monitoring potential human smuggling and illegal fishing on the Black Sea almost ditched…
War in Ukraine rains on Putin’s Victory Day parade
It may be having trouble on the battlefield, but the Russian army does know how to stage a parade. Behind…
Putin has made Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin eat his words
He huffed, and he puffed, and he damn near blew his own house down. The way Yevgeny Prigozhin, the man…
How ordinary Russians continue to resist Putin
Russia is gearing up for its annual festival of state-sponsored militarist kitsch that are the 9 May Victory Day celebrations,…
