ironically, putin s denial of ukraine s identity has strengthened what he set out to destroy. my guest is olesya khromeychuk. writer, historian and sister of a fallen ukrainian soldier. even now, do ukraine s allies understand what the stakes really are in this war? olesya khromeychuk, welcome to hardtalk. thank you so much for inviting me, stephen. it s a great pleasure to have you in this studio in london. and you live in london. you re the director of the ukrainian institute here in london. you re an historian of ukraine and eastern europe. and yet, i am sure that a lot of your mind is in ukraine. what kind of a distance do you keep from the daily reality of your homeland being at war? perhaps only physical distance, i suppose. the distance that, i suppose, would take 2a hours or so to cross, because at the moment we can t fly to ukraine any more, and it takes about 2k hours to get to my hometown now, which the journey that usually would take me 2.5 hours to fly to my home
moscow, beijing and kyiv mac. vladimir putin has also suspended moscow s involvement in a key nuclear arms treaty. we ll examine the implications. also in newsday this hour: mexico s former security chief is found guilty of taking bribes in return for helping drug dealers. the east coast of madagascar is being lashed by high winds and heavy rain as cyclone freddy makes landfall. and empty food shelves in the uk: why are some supermarkets having to limit sales of fruit and veg? live from our studio in singapore this is bbc news. it s newsday. welcome to the programme. we have a tale of two presidents for you this hour from the us and russia. we ll get to american president joe biden in a moment but, first, russian leader vladimir putin. he s announced he s suspending russian participation in the last major nuclear arms control agreement with the us. in his two hour state of the nation address, mr putin accused the west of starting the war in ukraine and seeking to destroy russ