Stroll around the elegant capitals of Georgia and Armenia and you could be almost anywhere in Europe. The grand boulevards, familiar luxury brands, fast-food outlets, smart restaurants and gridlocked traffic suggest that you might be in Hungary or the Czech Republic.

Only the cruciform shape of the domed and ancient churches place you elsewhere; that, and in Georgia’s Tbilisi at least, the ubiquitous anti-Russian, anti-Putin graffiti.