of a wider war with the west? support is already quite high and, of course, if the war comes to russian towns and cities, then russia ordinary russians definitely will feel that this war is even more justified for moscow. what s life like in syria nowadays the country where russia developed its tactics for bombarding civilians? you can see in the streets that people are digging in the garbage to get some food. that s something unheard of in syria before. and is international sport in danger of being overwhelmed by middle eastern oil money? what we ve seen in recent years | is these countries increasinglyl invest in sport as a means - of legitimising and normalising that country in the eyes of the western world. l western pressures are growing on russia. there are still disagreements about precisely how to impose
what do ordinary russians think about the dangers of a wider war with the west? support is already quite high and, of course, if the war comes to russian towns and cities, then russia ordinary russians definitely will feel that this war is even more justified for moscow. what s life like in syria nowadays the country where russia developed its tactics for bombarding civilians? you can see in the streets that people are digging in the garbage to get some food. that s something unheard of in syria before. and is international sport in danger of being overwhelmed by middle eastern oil money? what we ve seen in recent years | is these countries increasinglyl invest in sport as a means - of legitimising and normalising that country in the eyes of the western world. l western pressures are growing on russia.
that the russians have been using that they saw work so successfully in syria. and they have had trouble taking mariupol. we also know that the ministry of defence in the uk suggested yesterday that they might use white phosphorus, not a chemical weapon but it has similar attributes. it will be a challenge, for sure. you talk about syria, going back in time russian has been part of the opcw, the organisation for the prohibition of chemical weapons along with the un joint investigative mechanism, are they still part of that? absolutely, tthe russians are part of it, and in 2017 they declared they had no chemical weapons, but they attacked my hometown, salisbury, with chemical weapons just a year later. in effect the ukrainian government could request the organisation of the prohibition of chemical weapons to investigate
but doing that in a war zone, somewhere like mariupol, would be virtually impossible and would take time, so we need to rely on intelligence that nato is collecting and the ukrainian government is collecting so we can take a view on whether this is being used, and the response that will happen. i believe we need to bolster the ukrainian military, especially the air force, to try to make sure these atrocities are less likely in the future. carrying along the line of what action was taken in the past and the conflict in syria france, the uk, the us were directly involved in missile strikes on airfields where the aircraft that were distributing, when it was proven that chemical weapons had been used, they conducted missile strikes on those locations. is that something the western allies and nato would now consider if it
and these are just preliminary reports, that would not necessarily be the red line, use of chemical weapons that people have been talking about. that is not yet confirmed. but the possibility of it being used in mariupol was actually raised yesterday by officials. so that s one possibility. another one, that s one possibility. another one, that us officials have raised, is that us officials have raised, is that they could be some kind of riot control agent, tear gas or something being used against people. so far there are less signs and confirmation that it is something as serious as a nerve agent, what we typically think of chemical weapons, the kind of thing used in syria. to know will take some investigation, it will take samples being taken and people will need to look at the symptoms people are showing to be sure what it was and that will be taking place as we speak. so far people are certainly being quite cautious about leaping to the conclusion that this is the most serious end