Martin Docherty-Hughes, SNP MP for West Dunbartonshire

THE importance of anniversaries is not simply in remembering events, but also in remarking upon what has changed: so it is this week with the third anniversary of the Russian invasion of Crimea.

With a temporary ceasefire announced, we should also reflect on the fact that we are in the middle of a war we thought no longer possible in Europe: some 10,000 people have lost their lives in the conflict started by so-called “self-defence forces” around the cities of Donetsk, Luhansk and Mariupol, with countless others displaced and the infrastructure ruined.

Recent weeks have seen worrying reports of increased movements of Russian heavy armour, especially round the town of Avdiivka. These units moving in and out of Ukraine across the border can happen only with a great deal of thought, planning and, most importantly, cooperation from the highest levels of the Russian military.

The “little green men” who appeared in Crimea have been reborn as “volunteer units”, supposedly in Eastern Ukraine of their own free will, a fantasy repeatedly disproved by open-source intelligence sites such as Bellingcat which have documented the movement of Russian soldiers from their units across the Federation to the front lines in Ukraine through their social media posts.

More echoes of Crimea came last month as Ukrainian forces on the front line began to relay messages on their mobile phones stating “go home” and “this is your Stalingrad!”. The wherewithal to use such sophisticated technology is beyond the ken of the rag-tag “self defence forces” and would have been deployed by Russian electronic warfare units illegally in Ukraine, or just across the border.

This is why the posturing of the Trump administration has been so worrying for many of our allies: Nato and the West’s strength has been its unity, and its biggest sponsor and supporter’s more isolationist agenda, mirrored in an increasingly withdrawn Brexit Britain, only play into Vladimir Putin’s hands.

This apparent Russian strength is based on the inherent weaknesses of a faltering Russian economy, which is having a profoundly negative impact on Russian society, and a Russian military which is still no match for Nato forces, even if modernisation in certain areas has brought some of a Cold War force into the 21st century. So, as we reflect on what has changed since February 2014, let us remind ourselves too about the things that should not have changed: our commitment to the international rules-based system and the guarantees we give to our new allies and friends in the Baltic States as they look nervously at Eastern Ukraine.

Let us not waver, either, from a commitment to strengthen democracy in Ukraine. Diplomatic and military support must come with a continuing commitment by the Ukrainian government and political elites towards economic and democratic empowerment: breaking up the oligarchies that had flourished there and cementing trust in central government.

It seems that President Trump has even called for Russia to return Crimea to Ukraine: that’s a change we want to believe in.