WASHINGTON-backed organisations describing themselves as charities are leading the charge for the scrapping of Russia’s Nord Stream 2 and increased sanctions against Moscow.

In an email to the Morning Star, International Renaissance Foundation executive director Oleksandr Sushko called on Western countries to act against Russian aggression and warned of a European security crisis.

He described Ukraine as “Europe’s democratic frontier,” ignoring the fact that democracy was usurped in the country in 2014 when the European Union backed a coup against the government of elected president Viktor Yanukovich and that Kiev continues to suppress political critics, including by a ban on the Communist Party standing in elections and through media censorship.