As its economy collapses, Russia needs some help from its friends...

The crash of the oil price is a bonus to most of the world and especially to the largest oil importer, China. But for oil producers in general, and for one country in particular, it is a disaster. That country is Russia. Oil matters to Russia, in some ways even more than it does to the Middle East oil producers, the largest of which is Saudi Arabia. That is partly because if you add oil and gas together, Russia is the No 1 producer, but it is also because it has a much larger population to suppo