>When Putin made the foolish decision to illegally invade Ukraine, everyone was at pains inside our government – especially in the Foreign Office – to repeat the mantras, “this is not the Russian people, it is just a small clique in the Kremlin,” and “we don’t do regime change”.

>Well, the past three years have shown that this criminal and fascist regime goes way beyond a few bitter old KGB men. It turns out that the Russians not only support the invasion, but they support the use of torture, mass murder, assassinations and cyberattacks.

>As with Adolf Hitler’s Germany, Russia’s actions are only possible because of widespread support among its citizens.