Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping added another to their count of 40–odd summit meetings when the Russian and Chinese presidents convened in Beijing, later proceeding to Harbin in Northeast China, for two days of talks that ended Friday. At 9:55 Thursday evening Beijing time, a day’s work done, the two sat behind a long table draped in green to address “members of the media,” as Xi put it.

Some say that like the USSR, the current Russian presidency is brittle. But they are overlooking a lot

‘When talking about the ‘Putin Enigma’, we would first of all need to clarify exactly what the accepted definition of an enigma is, and does Vladimir Putin, the individual, warrant that rather lofty description, because the connotation here being that this person is something very special, exceptional.

Lack of a Coherent NATO Policy

The Russian presidential election has vividly brought out the fault lines in international politics in a way that seldom happens. That is because the political personality of President Vladimir Putin fills the global stage today like a Colossus. The extent to which the West has gone to demonise him shows what a morbid obsession this has become for them.

Ukraine war maximalists are portraying diplomacy as futile, pointing to a cherry picked quote from a recent interview with the Russian president

The spectre of Armageddon has been raised often enough during the 2-year old war in Ukraine that the reference to it in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s state of the union address on Thursday had a familiar ring about it. Therein lies the risk of misjudgement on the part of the western audience that Putin was only “crying wolf”.

The spectre of Armageddon has been raised often enough during the 2-year old war in Ukraine that the reference to it in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s state of the union address on Thursday had a familiar ring about it. Therein lies the risk of misjudgement on the part of the western audience that Putin was only “crying wolf”.

Two years ago today Vladimir Putin explained why he went to war. He said he had no intention to control Ukraine and only wanted to “demilitarize” and “de-Nazify” it, after the U.S. had pushed Russia too far, wrote Joe Lauria.

Let us stop with the moralism and put an end to a war we’re losing everywhere in the West, not just in Ukraine