Stewart Fleming has an insightful piece on the EU’s attempts to embrace the east published in European Voice:

Some years ago in Kiev, a Swedish diplomat remarked privately that the EU had been lucky when it embarked on its eastern enlargement. Russia, he said, was weak at that time, hamstrung by political turmoil and economic collapse. Interestingly, as today’s economic turmoil spreads around central and eastern Europe, Russia is again looking (for some, surprisingly) fragile. Only a few months ago many economists were projecting that the Russian economy would weather the storms better than most. Now Russia has seen the swiftest and sharpest downgrading of economic prospects suffered by any large economy.

Barclays Capital, an investment bank, is predicting that the Russian economy will shrink by a dramatic 6.9% this year, which would be the worst performance of any significant emerging-market economy. This compares with a projected fall of 3.7% for the eurozone. (…)