🎙Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks at a meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Alexander Gorchakov Public Diplomacy Fund

📍 Moscow, March 27, 2023

#UkrainianCrisis

🔹As was the case many times over the past several centuries, Russia faced blatant aggression from the collective West. This time, the Western countries used Ukrainian neo-Nazis as a spearhead of the attack.

‼️The West is providing massive military, financial, material and political support to the criminal Kiev regime with one goal in mind. Its goal is to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia, to destroy our economy, to foment public discontent resulting from an unfavourable social situation and thus to upset political stability in our country.

🔹In fact, today – President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly made it clear – what we are fighting for is not just our security or the lives of the Russians and Russian-speaking people residing in the new territories. We are fighting to not just eliminate threats to our security that are being created right on our borders, but to uphold Russian statehood as well. ❗️Make no mistake, we will respond in a tough manner to any and all unfriendly actions and use all the means that are available to us.

#GlobalMajority

☝️It makes perfect sense that about three-quarters of the countries around the world chose not to join the sanctions against Russia and adopted a balanced position on the situation in and around Ukraine despite the unprecedented pressure, blackmail and threats coming from the United States and, in general, the Anglo-Saxons and their satellites in order to make them change their minds and to force them to oppose Russia and join the anti-Russian coalition.

🔹Today, many countries from the Global South and the Global East, a.k.a. the #GlobalMajority, see Russia as a reliable and predictable partner that is open to interaction based on equality, balance, and mutual consideration of interests.

🔹Countries like 🇨🇳China and 🇮🇳 India, as well as many countries from Eurasia, the Asia-Pacific region, the Middle East, and Latin America are well aware of what is at stake. They are unwilling to give up their legitimate national interests in order to help the Anglo-Saxons and their minions maintain their hegemony or, more accurately, try to maintain their hegemony in the international arena.

#Russophobia

🇷🇺Notably, despite the dirty campaign to cancel everything that is Russian, we still have many friends around the world, including in the West. We know that they are sympathetic to our multi-ethnic country, love Russian culture, and share the traditional moral and family values that we promote.

🔹We see that the current leaders of the United States and their allies are mired in Neanderthal Russophobia and are ignoring the outcries of their own societies. If and when they come to their senses, we will decide on our position regarding prospects for our relationship. It will be our own decision based on our terms.

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