When Russian economist Sergei Guriev and The Conversation sat down to speak on the morning of February 16, the news of the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny hadn’t yet broken. In fact, we discussed how the international community could best protect Guriev‘s imprisoned friend. Guriev has since described Navalny’s death, decried by the West as a political assassination orchestrated by Kremlin, as “terrible news – not only for the future of Russia, but also for Ukraine, Europe and the