Putin’s terrible secrets exposed

If Vladimir Putin expected last week’s summit of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation in Samarkand would endorse his war in Ukraine, he was wrong. Coinciding with new evidence of mass graves and atrocities by Russian forces in Ukraine, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s public “upbraiding” of Mr Putin showed the Russian despot is isolated. “Today’s era is not an era of war, and I have spoken to you on the phone about this,” the Indian leader said publicly. For seven months, the world’s most populous democracy and a member, alongside Australia, Japan and the US, of the Quad alliance remained silent, shamefully, about Mr Putin’s onslaught on Ukraine. India’s unwillingness to condemn a longstanding ally on which it continues to rely for much of its military equipment was used by Moscow to trumpet its claims that Mr Putin could count on the support of a respected democracy such as India. Mr Modi put an end to such claims with his unexpected admonishment of Mr Putin. Looking discomforted, Mr Putin said he “understood” Mr Modi’s concerns, claiming he wanted to end the war as soon as possible.

Mr Putin gave a similar response to the concerns of his “no limits” ally, Chinese President Xi Jinping, in a rare display of tension between the two. “We understand your questions and your concerns,’’ Mr Putin said. “We will certainly explain our position.’’ Beijing did not mention Ukraine in its readout of the meeting.

None of this suggests any diminution in the ominous “no limits” alliance Mr Putin and Mr Xi established in Beijing during the Winter Olympics, before Russia invaded Ukraine. As Defence Minister Richard Marles says, joint military exercises between Russia and China in the north Pacific show a “growing” relationship between the autocratic nations. It has put the rules-based world order under strain. “The relationship affects the strategic circumstances that we have to deal with and the complexity of those circumstances,” Mr Marles said. “We’re seeing that in eastern Europe with Russia’s appalling invasion of Ukraine, but we’re seeing it in the Indo-Pacific as well.”

With Mr Putin, in Samarkand, publicly forced on to the back foot over Ukraine, the world’s democracies should redouble pressure on his regime and support for Kyiv’s democratic government. Now that India has honoured its democratic traditions, it too should join its allies in pushing the Russian tyrant to come to his senses. Ukrainian troops, recapturing swaths of territory, uncovered scenes that almost defied description. A mass grave outside the town of Izyum, between Donbas and Kharkiv, contained more than 400 corpses. Other victims of Mr Putin’s deadly brutality, many showing signs of torture, have also been found. The 17 people dumped in a single grave, other graves with women and young children, are testimony to Russia targeting the innocent and vulnerable. It did the same in Chechnya and Syria. At Bucha, near Kyiv, in March 450 bodies were found as Russian troops retreated. Most had been tortured, shot or bludgeoned to death. Human rights groups have documented 430 “incidents involving potential war crimes” across Ukraine, including systematic sexual violence and rape, murderous attacks on civilians and on food, water and medical supplies. Mr Putin may ignore the dissent and questioning that confronted him among those he regarded as allies in Samarkand. The savagery of the war crimes uncovered demands global action to intensify pressure on Moscow.