Lucinda Creighton: Far right and hard left make strange bedfellows in their support of Putin

The truth is that there is no such thing as Nato expansionism, it is a fiction which is being used by the radical left as an excuse for Russia’s unconscionable invasion of a sovereign nation

A mural by street artist Harry Greb in Rome portrays the face of Valdimir Putin with a birthmark on his head in the shape of Ukraine. Picture: Getty

Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked, unwarranted, illegal and unconscionable invasion of the sovereign nation of Ukraine last week was met by many on the hard left and the hard right with conditional condemnation, and an effort to somehow justify the onslaught.

For some time, both sides have held Putin up as an icon. Right-wing extremists love his strong man routine, his 19th century imperialism and his nativist nationalism. Left-wing extremists sympathise with his nostalgic affinity with the ...