There was much mirth in the West this week when Vladimir Putin’s Victory Day parade through Red Square included just one tank, itself a relic from a museum. The inference was that Russia has lost so much military kit in Ukraine that it is a shadow of the military superpower the Soviet Union used to be.

The West’s sweeping sanctions on Russia following its invasion of Ukraine are shaping up to be the West’s most monumental miscalculation in modern history. The sanctions have not brought the Russian economy to its knees, as was widely predicted. Instead, it’s the Western economies that are reeling, their economic growth all but stopped. Many of them are simultaneously suffering from both high inflation and energy shortages.

Event was ‘overwhelmingly pro-Russian’, says one attendee, as bank calls clients to apologise

Less than Nine Percent of Western Firms Have Divested from Russia

The Ukraine crisis has more or less reinforced the nearly global view that the world is better served with multipolarity and multilateralism.

Sanctions always fail, as the Chinese found out long ago.

To observe Zelensky’s statement to western media, arguing that African countries may face famines, is both absurd and disingenuous.

Moscow is raking in more revenue than ever with the help of new buyers, new traders and the world’s seemingly insatiable demand for crude

In his State of the Union address, President Biden announced that Russia was “isolated from the world more than [it] ever has been.” He said that “We are choking off Russia’s access to technology that will sap its economic strength and weaken its military for years to come.”

To avoid sanctions, countries are actively reopening moribund routes and creating greater connectivity across the Middle East and Asia.