Time for a new Iron Curtain?

Whenever this terrible war in Ukraine ends – and it looks ever-likely that Ukraine’s brave President, Volodymyr Zelenskyy will be bludgeoned into accepting a peace agreement carving away large chunks of his territory to reward the illegal invader – this new boundary should mark the eastern frontier of Europe, shutting off Russia from free, democratic and civilised society.

Russia has forfeited the right to call itself a European nation. What values does it share with Europe? By what measure can the Moscow regime rank alongside the parliaments and assemblies of France, Berlin or London?

What right has the lapdog media of Izvestiya, Komsomolskaya Pravda or Rossiya 1, to be mentioned in the same breath as Deutsche Welle, Le Monde or the BBC?

And what right has the smirking Russian President, Vladimir Putin, who in US President Trump’s own words, talks about peace and the next night sends drones to blow up a nursing home, to be considered alongside Starmer, Macron and von der Leyen?

At 17.1 million square kilometres, Russia is by far the biggest country in the world in land mass, almost double the size of the next largest, yet in the last two decades it has nibbled away at Georgia, and Moldova and launched an all-out invasion of Ukraine – all in the spurious claim of protecting ethic Russians and Russian speakers who live within those societies.

Yet while the Russian leader is prepared to go to war over Russians who live beyond his country he is not so concerned over his citizens at home. In no measure of living standards does Russia rank within the top 50 of nations, while in many remote areas life has little changed, or improved, since the days of the Tzars.

It is no wonder that Ukrainians so strenuously resist efforts to incorporate them into Putin’s paradise with its sustained population decline brought about by low birth rates, high death rates, alcoholism and despite the carefully choreographed shows of support, rampant pessimism over the future.

In his refusal to accept these facts about his nation, to allow even constructive debate over how improvements can be made, Putin more closely resembles the leaders of The People’s Republic of China and North Korea than any in the West. He has elected to keep company with the Asian dictatorships and there Russia must remain.  

Europe can do nothing about this, but every effort should be made to ensure Russia remains forever within its western borders. It may be time for a new Iron Curtain to be erected.  

Putin has played fast and loose with the nations it still terms as its “near abroad” for long enough and it is time for a united cry from European capitals, with or without the backing of Washington, that it ends now.