To judge by the tone of the discussions at the G7 summit in Tuscany, Russian President Vladimir Putin must be ruing the day he ever decided to give his backing to Syrian dictator Basha al-Assad. The G7 group of leading nations seems determined to present a united front in the wake of last week’s missile strikes by the US on an Assad regime airbase that intelligence officials believe was being used to launch chemical attacks. Serious consideration is being given to Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson’s demand for new, tougher sanctions to be imposed on Russia to force Mr Putin “to face the truth about the tyrant he is still propping up”. The G7 foreign ministers will approve new sanctions if Mr Putin refuses to remove Russian troops from Syria and drop his backing for the Syrian president.

At a time when the Russian economy is already struggling as a result of the sanctions imposed after Moscow’s illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, any further measures will cause the Russian people even more pain, and could have serious repercussions for Mr Putin’s hopes of winning re-election in next year’s presidential contest. They should also close the loopholes that have enabled Russian oligarchs with links to the Kremlin to launder billions of dollars through European banks, many of them based in London.