The West is not happy with his roll over the Ukraine…
The Russian President’s rich supporters are seing their money and assets dry up around the world and calling him to stop his efforts against the Ukraine…
His countries currency is almoast worthless…
He actually has protests going on in Russia….
President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that Western sanctions on Russia were akin to a declaration of war and warned that any attempt to impose a no-fly zone in Ukraine would lead to catastrophic consequences for the world.
Putin reiterated that his aims were to defend Russian- speaking communities through the “demilitarisation and de-Nazification” of the country so that Russia’s former Soviet neighbour became neutral and no longer threatened Russia..
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Putin dismissed concerns that some sort of martial law or emergency situation could be declared in Russia. He said such a measure was imposed only when there was significant internal or external threat.
“We don’t plan to introduce any kind of special regime on Russian territory – there is currently no need,” Putin said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the West was behaving like a bandit by cutting economic relations over the conflict in Ukraine but that Russia was far too big to be isolated as the world was much larger than just the United States and Europe.
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So far, economic pressure against Russia appears to be highly effective, crimping Russian trade even in goods that haven’t officially been placed under sanctions. The financial restrictions that have already been imposed have made transactions with Russia — even the purchase of oil — difficult; fears of future sanctions, plus the general sense that any Western institutions perceived as helping the Putin regime will face harsh treatment from regulators, have led to widespread self-sanctioning, cutting off even trade that is formally permitted.
We don’t know yet how this plays out, but if we see the kinds of mass civilian casualties and reign of terror that seem all too likely in the weeks ahead, the effect may be to largely isolate Russia from the rest of the world economy.
Economists have a rather arcane term for this kind of isolation: “autarky.” And it’s likely to be extremely damaging.
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So far, economic pressure against Russia appears to be highly effective, crimping Russian trade even in goods that haven’t officially been placed under sanctions. The financial restrictions that have already been imposed have made transactions with Russia — even the purchase of oil — difficult; fears of future sanctions, plus the general sense that any Western institutions perceived as helping the Putin regime will face harsh treatment from regulators, have led to widespread self-sanctioning, cutting off even trade that is formally permitted.
We don’t know yet how this plays out, but if we see the kinds of mass civilian casualties and reign of terror that seem all too likely in the weeks ahead, the effect may be to largely isolate Russia from the rest of the world economy.
Economists have a rather arcane term for this kind of isolation: “autarky.” And it’s likely to be extremely damaging….
Note…
But President Biden and the West have been careful to NOT touch the Russian Energy sector with Sanctions ….