The question that BBC announcers repeated over and over again was, "can Russia be trusted to provide for Europe's energy needs?"
'Experts' stumbled over themselves to, once again, decry the Kremlin's supposed descent into autocratic rule (which, like American "shattered innocence" is an event that seems to occur anew almost daily if the Western media is any guide) and denounce Putin's attempt to derail Ukraine's democracy via heavy handed gas supply brinkmanship.
I listened to quite a few of these BBC reports and I can't recall any - not even one - that focused on the actual structure of Gazprom's relationship with Ukraine; not once was there a nuts and bolts description of the situation, just rant after rant after rant (in soft and learned sounding, British, French or German accents) about Russian perfidy and brave sounding declarations that Europe could use find other sources, leaving Russia poorer.
Even a non expert such as me could easily pick apart the really quite stupid statements the supposed Euro experts on all matters Russian were presenting.
It was really quite pathetic. The Western fixation on Ukraine is odd and annoying.
.d.