Lavrov maintains before German Chancellor Baerbock that the Kremlin does not threaten anyone, but it does receive them
The first face-to-face meeting of the foreign ministers of Russia and Germany, Sergei Lavrov and Annalena Baerbock, took place this Tuesday in Moscow also in a tense manner, like those held in recent days by Russian representatives and their colleagues from the United States and NATO. Baerbock told his Russian interlocutor that “it is difficult for European countries not to perceive the large concentration of Russian forces” along the border with Ukraine as a threat. Lavrov responded to this by maintaining that his country “does not threaten anyone” and deploys its troops within its own territory as it deems appropriate.
“We have explained that we cannot accept any demand regarding the actions of our Armed Forces in our own territory,” said the head of Russian Diplomacy during the press conference he offered together with his German counterpart after the talks they held. She snapped that “in recent weeks, more than a hundred thousand Russian soldiers and military equipment have been deployed near Ukraine for no apparent reason.”
But Lavrov insisted that “many Western politicians call the presence of our troops on our territory and the necessary exercises for combat training an escalation.” In his opinion, “any country carries out these same types of activities to prepare its Army.” “We do not threaten anyone, but we do hear threats against us,” Lavrov added, expressing the hope that all of this “is only the reflection of certain emotions of certain forces in the West.”
He referred, in the next line, to Baerbock’s own warnings issued the day before during his visit to Kiev, that any Russian attack on Ukraine “will have consequences for the Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline.” “As for the consequences that, as you have said, we might have to face, I cannot guess what measures the German government will take in this or that situation, but we have not given any pretext for a new conflict situation to arise,” The Russian foreign minister stressed and also warned that “politicizing a commercial project such as Nord Stream-2 is counterproductive.”
«Security guarantees»
At the press conference, Lavrov explained that in his talks with Baerbock they addressed the issue of the “security guarantees” that Moscow demands from the US and NATO to reduce the tension around Ukraine and normalize relations with the West. The Kremlin demands in particular that Ukraine never join the Alliance, reduce the presence of this Western military bloc in Eastern Europe and ensure that military bases are not deployed in former Soviet republics, not counting Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, which are already members of NATO.
“We have dealt with our initiatives on security guarantees in sufficient detail, which must be reliable and legally binding (.) now we are waiting for the answer -in writing- to be able to continue the negotiations, we are committed to continuing the discussion in this regard,” said the Russian minister. And, after finishing the meeting with his German counterpart, Lavrov received a phone call from the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, to whom he repeated the same as to Baerbock, that he needs a response to the proposal on “security guarantees”. And both ministers, according to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, agreed to meet next Friday in Geneva to continue talking. Before that, Blinken will travel to Kiev as his German colleague did on Monday, to show his support for the Ukrainian authorities.
In Geneva precisely 10 Russian and American representatives met last day and there was no agreement. Later, on the 12th, they did it in Brussels with NATO, also without results. The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, described both attempts at rapprochement as “failure”.
However, the head of Russian Diplomacy said that his country has nothing against the United States joining the Normandy Group, made up of Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine with the aim of putting an end to the conflict between Kiev and the pro-Russian separatists from Donetsk and Lugansk (Donbass).
Lavrov and Baerbock also discussed relations between Russia and the European Union on Tuesday, which, in Moscow’s opinion, are going through a “terrible” moment. The possibility that the Kremlin will retaliate against German journalists accredited in Russia after the authorities in Berlin decided to block the Russian television channel in German RT.DE.
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