A little over a week ago I pondered which country would be next to follow Iceland and Latvia on the list of national governments which have fallen as a result of the global economic turmoil.
Reports suggest Ukraine is heading into some major instability, with daily queues outside banks and some cities “going days without heat or water because they cannot pay their bills”.
Ukraine holds a very strategic position in some of the political faultlines between Russia and western Europe, and is also big enough to create wider economic and social instability if it really hits the skids.
Things are starting to look sufficiently bad that the European Union itself is starting to show serious strain.
Mirek Topolanek, the Czech PM and current holder of the EU’s rotating presidency put it this way: “This is the greatest crisis in the history of European integration.”
I know many people are still suggesting things aren’t as bad as they seem, especially in Australia, but I’m not very convinced,
