Putin is the real problem facing the West

For the past two weeks, more than 100 world leaders have gathered in Glasgow at the Cop26 summit in an attempt to reach an agreement to limit global warming to less than 1.5 degrees. However, while dignitaries have been distracted by the underwhelming events in Scotland, a major international crisis has developed on Europe’s eastern fringe.

The United States has alerted its allies that thousands of Russian troops are massing on the border with Ukraine amid fears that Vladimir Putin may be planning an invasion in a repeat of his 2014 annexation of Crimea. Ukraine estimates that there are now 90,000 Russian soldiers on its border, with more assisting pro-russian separatists who seized parts of the Donbas region seven years ago. The civil war there has seen 14,000 people killed and millions uprooted from their homes, in spite of a peace accord brokered by France and Germany.

Putin remains determined to undermine Ukrainian independence, a project he sees as vital to Russian security by providing a bulwark against the West and which he has successfully woven into a powerful domestic narrative of a Russian nation unfairly surrounded by hostile Nato forces. Needless to say, Western powers reject such a claim, pointing to numerous instances of provocation in recent months and years on the part of Russia.

One such is still taking place on the border between Poland and Belarus. There, the Belarusian dictator, Alexander Lukashenko, whose regime’s survival is reliant on Putin’s support, has been effectively “weaponising” migrants, deliberately herding thousands of desperate people towards the border with Poland in a bid to undermine Warsaw and, in the long term, foment division among EU member states. There has already been an appalling humanitarian cost, with thousands left stranded in forests in freezing conditions.

When the EU threatened to increase sanctions, an angry Lukashenko warned that in return he would cut off gas supplies.

Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, has already dispatched British troops in a “non-combatant” role to assist Polish forces on their border and further action may well soon be necessary. The Government is keen that our actions not be seen as a provocation, but they highlight a key difference between Poland and Ukraine, one of which Putin is well aware: only the former is a member of Nato.

The Russian President has called Nato’s bluff in Ukraine before and may yet gamble that he can do so again – and the West must be ready.

In recent weeks, we have had not one but two major gatherings of world leaders. This winter, we may come to regret that these meetings were not used to work out a strategy for containing Putin rather than an over-hyped attempt to deal with climate change many years in the future.

Shame on Macron

With a record 1,185 migrants arriving from across the Channel on one day this week, a remedy for how to stop small boats crossing from France seems as far away as ever. It comes amid claims that the fast deteriorating diplomatic relations between our two countries are playing a key role in preventing a solution.

Home Secretary Priti Patel has set up a task force to oversee the crisis after the astonishing news that so many could have crossed on one day. This comes in a long line of initiatives that have tried, and so far failed, to put a stop to the crisis. The British Government cannot absolve itself of blame for the fact that a situation it has promised to tackle is only getting worse.

However, while the French government may not be actively encouraging this exodus, it is becoming increasingly clear that it is doing far too little to prevent it. This is despite Britain offering £54million in return for promised French counter measures. The French claim this money will enable 100 per cent of migrant boats to be intercepted, but instead this month has seen fewer than 30 per cent being stopped and only one in 10 on Thursday.

Our two countries are already at loggerheads over French claims to fishing rights and the issue of the future of Northern Ireland. If such political problems are indeed influencing France’s willingness to engage with this issue, it speaks extremely ill of Emmanuel Macron’s credentials as a statesman.

Missed steaks

Don’t stand in the way of hungry diners and their meat. That seems as good a lesson as any to take from the dispute between chef Daniel Humm and his now former employer, Claridge’s hotel, which took against his desire to create a “fully plant-based menu”. The hotel deserves full-blooded support, if such a thing is not too offensive to the plant-based community. There may be much to be said for a vegan diet, if not for the virtue-signalling that often seems to accompany it. But there is even more to be said for the principle of free choice. Meat has been unfairly maligned in recent times, not least by environmentalists who see evil on the end of our forks. It is heartening to see, for once, that the vegan brigade have bitten off more than they can chew.