The pro-Russian tone of most of your correspondents regarding the Ukraine crisis is deeply disturbing.

Ukraine kicks out its kleptocratic and vicious leader, who then asks for support from his friend across the border. Mr Putin is only too happy to help, given that he wants the Ukraine as part of his sphere of influence and fears it drifting West. So he sends in his troops, thinly disguised, to take over Ukrainian military installations and threatens further violence. This is justified apparently, because the US does the same sort of thing, ethnic Russian Ukrainians were under threat and the new government is a bunch of neo-nazis.

The facts are, that there was no threat to Russians-speakers and there are no neo-nazis in the new government, though as a coalition it does contain some right-wingers. People who seek to defend the indefensible in the Ukraine will smooth the path for Mr Putin to march into other neighbouring states, if he doesn't like their politics. The Baltic states, with their ethnic Russian populations, are vulnerable - and they are members of NATO…

Michael Lloyd,

4 Stanley Place,

Dunbar.

Your correspondents (Letters, March 6) are right to endorse the sage comments of Harry Reid, but Allan Steele's observation that Viktor Yanukovich "invited" the Russians in is no more a justification for military intervention than the fact Hazifullah Amin invited the Soviets into Afghanistan in 1979. The desperate manoeuvres of a corrupt tyrant have no democratic value.

The irony is that Kiev's proud title was "mat' russkych gorodov" - the Mother of Russian cities. Kiev is the ultimate source, the "fons et origo", of Russian culture and civilization. From the days of Byzantium, art and the Christian religion came here first to the Russian land. Here was her Golden Age, her Camelot, so to speak. There should be no conflict.

Eugene, the lone Ukrainian piper who played "Bonnie Galloway" as bullets whizzed past in Kiev, said: "When musicians play during a riot, it means the people involved are not terrorist or extremists. They are normal people fighting for their rights and their state." He is right.

If sanity and wisdom prevailed there is an obvious solution to the problem of ethnic Russians in Ukraine. Where they desire, they can be offered dual nationality, as were Irish citizens living in the UK. Ukraine could then function as a bridge between Russia and the EU, enabling Russia herself - eventually - to return to the European family of nations, where historically she belongs.

This demands patience, calmness and imagination, which, tragically, are growing less likely by the day.

Brian Quail,

2 Hyndland Avenue,

Glasgow.