Putin marches toward showdown with West
Vladimir Putin’s landslide victory in Russia’s presidential election, while hardly a surprise, presages escalating tensions with the West amid the confrontation over a nerveagent poisoning.
The UK’s rallying international support for action against Russia after directly blaming Putin for the attack on former double-agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is meeting European Union counterparts in Brussels on Monday, after Russia expelled 23 British diplomats on Saturday in a tit-for-tat retaliation against the UK.
The attack shows Russia’s waging “modern war” on the West, which must “wake up” to defend itself, according to Manfred Weber, who leads the European People’s Party in the European Parliament and is an ally of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. EU and NATO members are having “intense discussions” on possible political and economic sanctions, a senior Polish official says.
Putin called the allegations of Russian involvement “complete nonsense” after he won a record 77 percent in an election marred by opposition allegations of vote-rigging. Ella Pamfilova, Russia’s central election commission chief, sarcastically thanked the West for helping to boost turnout with the confrontation. “Our people always unite at difficult times,” she said. “We never weaken when there is such pressure.”