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Sergey Lavrov-Russian Foreign Minister
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said it’s necessary to stop attempts by “placeholders” in Kiev to “betray the vital interests” of the Ukrainian people and conduct the policy that’s aiding the transformation of the country into an “anti-Russia.”
“The main thing is to stop the attempts of the placeholders, who illegally seized power, to betray the vital interests of the Ukrainian people and, in order to please the West, turn their country into an ‘anti-Russia’ as the meaning of their existence,” the minister said at a session of the UN Human Rights Council, speaking by a video link.
“The real hysteria observed today in NATO and the EU only confirms that it was the creation of an ‘anti-Russia’ that was and remains the goal of the US and all its allies lined up by Washington.”
“The mass burials discovered in Donbass serve as an irrefutable proof of criminal consequences of massive shellings of Donbass civilian objects. A forensic investigation has determined that most of the dead are women and seniors. Our Western colleagues simply ignore numerous facts of these outrageous violations of the basic human right —right for life,” Lavrov said. “Our attempts to draw the Human Rights Council’s attention to the atrocities that have been going on for eight years were met with indifference.”
“All these massive, systemic attacks on rights and freedoms, the consistent planting of neo-Nazism are taking place with the connivance of the US, Canada, the EU states, which are arrogantly declaring themselves ‘standard of democracy’ (…),” the top diplomat noted.
Lavrov pointed out that the West started to turn a blind eye to the developments in Ukraine in February 2014, “when the radicals carried out an unconstitutional coup d’etat, breaking the agreement with the then president of Ukraine that was reached under EU guarantees.”
The Russian foreign minister noted that the residents of the eastern Ukraine, who did not accept the coup, “were accused of terrorism, although they did not attack anyone.” “[The Kiev forces] (…) bombed their cities using aircraft, artillery and multiple rocket launchers. They destroyed civilian facilities, schools and hospitals. They killed civilians,” Lavrov said. According to him, the Kiev leadership also imposed an economic, transport and food blockade against Donbass and got away with all of this, while international structures were limited to sterile calls for peace.
Russia won’t violate Ukrainians’ civil rights, Lavrov assures. Russia respects the Ukrainian people and does not intend to infringe on the citizens’ interests, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in his video address.
“As [Russian] President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stressed, we always respect the Ukrainian people, their language and traditions. We do not intend to infringe on the interests of the Ukrainian citizens in any way, with whom we are united not only by a shared history, civilisational, spiritual, cultural kinship but also simply by blood, family ties,” Lavrov said.
“Millions of Ukrainian natives reside in Russia today. As far as we are concerned, they are our [people]. We have always been together and will be many times stronger and more successful.”
On February 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the recognition of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics. The treaties on friendship, cooperation, and mutual assistance were signed with their leaders.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a televised address on February 24 that in response to a request by the leaders of the Donbass republics he had made a decision to carry out a special military operation. The Russian head of state stressed that Moscow had no plans of occupying Ukrainian territories.
Russia’s Defence Ministry reported later that Russian troops were not delivering strikes against Ukrainian cities. It emphasized that Ukrainian military infrastructure was being destroyed through the use of precision weapons. Civilians are not threatened, the Russian military assured. — TASS
The EU states are trying to get away from an honest and direct dialogue, choosing the path of unilateral illegitimate sanctions, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated in a video message at the Conference on Disarmament on Tuesday.
“I am glad to speak at the Conference on Disarmament. I was hoping to do it offline in Geneva. However, this was impossible due to the EU’s refusal to respect one of the fundamental human rights – the right to freedom of movement,” the Russian top diplomat noted.
“Choosing the path of unilateral illegitimate sanctions, the EU states are trying to get away from honest and direct contacts that could help find political solutions to acute global challenges,” Lavrov said.
After that, the US, EU, UK, as well as some other states, said that they were imposing penalties against Russian individuals and legal entities. London was the first to close its airspace for Russian airplanes on February 25. On February 27, the foreign ministers of 27 EU countries approved the complete closure of the organization’s airspace for Russia.
Sergey Lavrov underscored that Russia has always believed that there could be no winners in a nuclear war and that such war must never happen. Russia considers the presence of US nuclear weapons in a number of European states unacceptable, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in his video address to the Geneva conference on disarmament, adding that the US nuclear weapons must have long been returned back to American soil.
“It is unacceptable for us that US nuclear weapons still remain in a number of European states in contradiction to the basic points of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. The bad practice of joint nuclear missions with the participation of non-nuclear NATO states continues. During such missions, the use of nuclear weapons against Russia is being practiced,” he noted. “US nuclear weapons must have long been returned home, and the corresponding infrastructure in Europe must have long been eliminated.”
The Minister underscored that Russia has always believed that there could be no winners in a nuclear war and that such war must never happen.
“This principle has been confirmed in the June 16, 2021, joint statement of the presidents of Russia and the US, as well in the June 28, 2021, joint statement of the heads of Russia and China. It is important that, under Russia’s initiative and with its most active participation, a joint statement of leaders of the five nuclear powers was developed and adopted on January 3 about prevention of nuclear war and prevention of an arms race,” Lavrov added.
Lavrov says threat of new arms race and conflict in space is becoming more real. Certain countries have started to utilize outer space for military purposes and the threat of a new arms race and a conflict in space is becoming increasingly real.
“Certain countries have embarked on weapons deployment in space,” he said. “Doctrinal documents have been adopted, plans to put into orbit weapons systems, including offensive ones, are being designed and shifted to the phase of implementation.”
“The threat of a new arms race and transforming space into a theater of an armed conflict is becoming more real,” Lavrov went on to say. “This all has potential to bring severe consequences for global stability.”
The trilateral partnership between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States (AUKUS) affects the nuclear weapons non-proliferation regime, provokes tension and creates pre-requisites for a new spiral of the arms race, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in a video address on Tuesday.
“The contradictory idea by Australia, Great Britain and the US to create the AUKUS exclusive pact causes our questions. It is obvious that AUKUS is adversely affecting the nuclear non-proliferation regime, provoking tension and creating pre-requisites for unleashing a new spiral of the arms race and, what is more, not only in the Asia-Pacific region,” Russia’s top diplomat pointed out. – TASS
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