Worldcrunch
Vladimir Putin says he is “ready” to talk with Volodymyr Zelensky. But it’s a feigned openness to dupe Trump, since he continues to question the legitimacy of the Ukrainian president and does not alter one iota his demands for a kind of capitulation by Kyiv and a reversal of Baltic entry into the Atlantic Alliance.
In a major move for sovereignty, the three Baltic states have cut their electricity supply from Russia and connected to the European grid. A collateral casualty of this shift is the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, now cut off from Russia and forced to generate its own power.
With Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas put on Russia’s Most Wanted list, Tallinn is drawing up clear plans on how it intends to secure its border with Russia — an idea it shares with Latvia and Lithuania. But the three small countries don’t have the territorial or strategic depth to absorb an attack the way Ukraine did, which is why they ultimately rely on NATO.
This week marks the opening of what’s been described as the biggest Swedish espionage case since the end of the Cold War, as tensions rise in the face of the Russian war in Ukraine.