Mijn mening is bekend, met een crisis in de Oekraine, die uitloopt op meer sancties over en weer, kan een herstel van o.a USG PEOPLE nog wel ff duren.
Toch een mooie dag, al hoewel momenteel is alles betrekkelijk !
Een artikel uit de independent !
Meestal als iemand echt in het nou is gedreven, zou ie zeggen, aan de kant of ik schiet !
Dan moet poetin zich toch ook in het nauw voelen gedreven, door te zeggen "" Then he gave a speech in which he warned other countries “not to mess with us” because Russia is a “leading nuclear power”.
Compleet de weg kwijt, maar nog gevaarlijker !
Russia’s weak spot
Britain, Nato and the West must continue to hit Vladimir Putin where it hurts: the Russian economy
This week, 150 of the world’s most powerful people will gather in Wales for the Nato summit. Looming at the top of the agenda will be the extraordinary actions of Russia, and the increasingly unpredictable and dangerous Vladimir Putin.
President Putin’s troops crossed the border into eastern Ukraine last week, in what any reasonable person would call an invasion. Then he gave a speech in which he warned other countries “not to mess with us” because Russia is a “leading nuclear power”. This is remarkable language from a world leader. There are two great taboos in the post-war European order: one, redrawing borders by force; two, alluding to the threat of nuclear weapons. Mr Putin has now done both; even his Cold War predecessors balked at that.
Perhaps, though, his threatening language is an indicator of just how uncertain he has become. The sanctions imposed on Russia by the West have bitten deeply into its economy; the country has been forced to sell its gas and oil at a bargain price to China and India, especially as the United States, replete with its own supplies of shale gas, has no interest in Russia’s wares.
For all his posturing, Mr Putin knows that his position is a weak one. But he has made the calculation that the West will not go to war over Ukraine. At the Nato summit, while sabres will doubtless be rattled, Putin is gambling that military action will not be called for.
Still, the West is not powerless. Sanctions will hurt us – but they will hurt Russia even more. We can keep Mr Putin off balance, and minimise the threat he poses to global stability, by putting pressure on Russia’s economy. Britain, and our allies in Nato and the West, must keep hitting him where it hurts.