WITH football’s World Cup just a matter of weeks away, attention is turning towards host-country Russia. Back in 2009, when the country bid for the right to hold the 2018 tournament, it was a rather different place: Dimitry Medvedev was president, oil prices were higher, the Russian economy was booming, and economic sanctions against it had yet to be imposed.
Since then, things have changed dramatically: Vladimir Putin has become a one-man nationalist juggernaut, while Russia has annexed Crimea, engaged in Syria, doped its own athletes, and hacked and trolled its way through elections, sports events and the like. Consequently, in …read more
Source: Asian Correspondent
