On 24 February 2022, Russia’s attempted lightning invasion of Ukraine will be two years old. Since then, a war of attrition has taken hold, killing at least 10,000 Ukrainian civilians according to the UN, as well as hundreds of thousands of soldiers on both sides. There seems to be no prospect of peace in the short term, and the front lines have not moved in a year, the Ukrainian counter-offensive having failed. For several weeks now, Russian bombing has been intensifying. With the March elections approaching, Vladimir Putin wants to regain the upper hand. The head of the Kremlin is careful to silence any dissident voices in his country, as shown by the assassination of Navalny, or that of a deserter found riddled with bullets in Spain. On the Ukrainian side, Volodymyr Zelensky remains dependent on Western aid, which is beginning to divide the countries concerned. In the United States, a return to the White House by Donald Trump – who has been very conciliatory towards the Russian president – has raised fears of the worst. In Europe, staff are preparing for Putin to go beyond Ukraine and end up attacking a NATO country.
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