It was only on Monday of this week that reports were rife that French carmaker Renault had amazingly resumed manufacturing in its Russian plants. This bucked the trend set by very many other global brands who hadn’t hesitated in shutting down their outlets in protest at the grotesque and murderous invasion of Ukraine.
Weirdly, the French government was reported as supporting Renault’s decision, despite Monsieur Macron being particularly outspoken about Putin’s slaughter of the innocents.
Now, however, reports reach us that Renault has had a change of heart and is, at last, actually shutting down its Russian plants.
What changed their mind? It could be that when the charismatic and much-admired Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy gave Renault a verbal kicking in one of his latest online addresses that was enough for the carmaker and they have finally, and rightly, decided to extricate themselves from Russia.