The Russian Foreign Minister addresses the media and answers questions during a joint news conference with Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto, Moscow, 19 November 2014

Ladies and gentlemen,

Good afternoon.

My Hungarian colleague Peter Szijjarto and I have had very fruitful talks, and have stressed the very stable and important relations that exist between our countries, which we regard as a top priority. These relations are based on historical traditions, mutual respect and pragmatism, which matter a great deal in the overly-ideological modern-day world.

As we noted, our bilateral contacts are developing further despite a complex situation in Europe. They were promoted spectacularly by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's visit to Moscow and his talks with President Vladimir Putin last January.

Our major joint projects include an understanding on the construction of an additional two nuclear energy units in Hungary with the participation of the Rosatom state corporation, and laying the South Stream gas pipeline through Hungary, which everyone expects to increase the energy security of Hungary and all of Europe.

Mr Szijjarto heads the Russian-Hungarian intergovernmental commission on economic cooperation, presided over on the Russian side by Agriculture Minister Nikolai Fyodorov. They met this morning for a detailed discussion of preparations for the next commission meeting, due to take place in the first quarter of 2015.

We expressed satisfaction with our cultural contacts and agreed on their further development, on stepping up exchanges between parliaments, regions and universities, and on further cooperation at the Finno-Ugric nations' forum.

Of the international themes, we focused the greatest attention on the Ukraine crisis. Though the European Union and Russia interpret the various episodes of this drama differently, Russians and Hungarians agree that there is the opportunity now to achieve full compliance with the Minsk agreements and toward this end, establish a permanent dialogue between the representatives of Kiev and the signatories of the agreement for Lugansk and Donetsk.

Our positions also align on the fight against terrorism, especially in the Middle East and North Africa. We agree that the world must resolutely oppose the Islamic State and other extremist formations in that region, including through prosecution of those involved in the organisation of terrorist acts and their accomplices. On the whole, we had a very good conversation, and I thank my colleague for our joint work.

Question (to Mr Szijjarto): What do you think of the prospects to settle the Ukraine crisis and otherwise improve the international climate?

Sergey Lavrov (following Mr Szijjarto's reply): As for the improvement of the present-day international climate, we discussed it during the talks. Mr Szijjarto told me about a meeting of the EU foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday, at which this sensitive theme featured prominently on the agenda.

We have confirmed the general opinion today that Russia and the EU are natural partners and both stand to gain with ever closer contacts, which will make the European Union, Russia and its Customs Union partners more competitive in this globalising world. As we see it, a professional dialogue between the relevant institutions of the European and Customs unions, and the emergent Eurasian Economic Union should be one of the nearest steps. Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier spoke in favour of such a dialogue yesterday, and Mr Szijjarto confirmed today that Hungary approves this approach.

I think the significance of the ideologically-based positions on the European agenda will come down as soon as we turn to practical economic problems, the solution of which will help to whip up economic growth and improve life in the Russian Federation and the European Union.

As for the Ukraine crisis, I agree with Mr Szijjarto that the available agreements must be complied with, on which point we have always insisted. This requires vigilance, as the understandings have been repeatedly violated, beginning with the known agreement of 21 February on the settlement of the Ukraine crisis, followed by the Geneva statement by the United States, the European Union, Ukraine and Russia, in which Kiev pledged to launch constitutional reform immediately and with all parts of the country taking part. This agreement was not complied with, either. So the people of southeastern Ukraine who did not put up with the coup and the attempts to impose alien ways on the population that had settled there for centuries have ample reasons not to believe the Kiev authorities, especially now that appeals are being voiced to bury the Minsk agreements and resort to violence. I hope we will draw lessons from the Ukraine crisis now, at its early stages, and not lose the chance provided in the Minsk process to launch a direct and stable dialogue between Kiev and the southeast Ukrainian signatories to the Minsk protocol. To coordinate the demarcation line, withdraw heavy weaponry and arrange monitoring of the line by UN observers is the most urgent task, on which both parties' representatives are working, as we say, "on the ground".

Question: What are the prospects of Russian-Hungarian trade and economic cooperation, including the South Stream projects, in the context of EU sanctions against Russia?

Sergey Lavrov: I can only repeat what I have said already today: The project is on the agenda. The parties repeated today all their obligations on documents signed for the South Stream. We highly appreciate this position and the willingness of our Hungarian partners to negotiate. We rely on the European Commission to understand the importance of the project, and we hope that it will be embodied in decisions which the European Commission and the European Union should pass in whole to implement a project that is crucial for European energy security.

Question: It was repeated many times during today's meeting that Russia and Hungary are major strategic partners. President Vladimir Putin said several hours ago that Hungary is Russia's crucial partner. But then, Hungary is a member of NATO and the European Union. Is there a contradiction here?

Sergey Lavrov: Since the beginning of NATO expansion, which made Hungary a member, and from the first days of its European Union membership, Hungary has, in our mind, behaved responsibly without using its member status to promote, let alone impose on others, any kind of Russophobic propaganda clichés, unlike some other NATO and EU members, who made use of the "solidarity principle" to shift these organisations toward an anti-Russian bias.

We have never noticed anything of this sort in Hungarian policy. We find it very reasonable for a nation to proceed not only based on bloc discipline, but, above all, to be led by its own interests. The number of such responsible nations grows with time. They have taken responsible attitudes in the European Union and NATO to call for normal equal relations with Russia. There is no alternative to an equal and mutually respectful dialogue with the purpose of balancing out interests that all too often do not align. We highly value Hungary for such policy.

Question: Could you comment on the recent media reports about Russia waiting for guarantees of Ukraine's non-aligned status? What guarantees is Russia insisting on, and should they be legally binding if they do appear? Will Russia change its position regarding Ukraine?

Sergey Lavrov: We are convinced – and we have said so since the beginning of the current historical period – that NATO's headlong expansion is a blunder that undermines European stability. High-level political declarations were made in their time in the OSCE and Russia-NATO Council framework, which proclaimed the principle of equal and indivisible security for all Euro-Atlantic nations. They vouched that no country would ever buttress its own security at the expense of others. Regrettably, these political declarations have been suspended. When the Warsaw Treaty was annulled, the OSCE got an unprecedented opportunity to become the cornerstone of the implemented principle of equal and indivisible security. However, the NATO states chose to preserve European demarcation lines and advance them eastward with the alliance's military infrastructure.

We could not overlook this in our military planning because, as we know, it is not intentions that really matter in military affairs (we were assured that nobody was encroaching on Russian interests), but actual emergent potential, which we had to take into account, and are currently taking into account. Ukraine provided a legislative basis for its non-aligned status. That was the only correct and responsible decision possible in this situation. Moldova made a similar decision.

I never doubt that the non-aligned status is of principled importance, not only for Euro-Atlantic stability but also from the point of Ukraine's essential national interests. We are working actively for Ukraine to launch a nationwide dialogue for national reconciliation and accord, and discuss how the many ethnic entities and religious denominations should coexist. The present Ukrainian leaders are, in the final analysis, calling to reject the non-aligned status, and do not conceal that they need blocs to tackle the problem of the southeast through the use of force, and to come to grips next with Russia as their main enemy.

I would also like to remind you of a decision made at the NATO summit in Bucharest in April 2008, saying literally that "Georgia and Ukraine will join NATO". Even in August of the same year, President Saakashvili trampled all his pledges underfoot, and attacked South Ossetia, populated by his country's citizens, and peacekeeping troops. Those who try to address Ukrainian problems through confrontation today have the same motives. The radical nationalists or national radicals who have come to the helm in Kiev are out to eradicate everything Russian from Ukrainian history and destroy all values that Russians have adhered to in Ukraine since time immemorial.

We are greatly alarmed by the latest moves by the Kiev authorities, aimed at strangling the Ukrainian southeast socially and economically. Information is also being circulated that Ukraine has notified, or is about to notify, the Council of Europe of the Ukrainian authorities suspending their obligations on the European Convention on Human Rights in the area of the so-called "anti-terrorist operation", i.e. in the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics. The Ukrainian rulers demand authorisation to abuse human rights there. I think this signal should put everyone on the alert.

As for the non-alignment guarantees, we have proposed, and are proposing again, to upgrade the above-mentioned political declarations on indivisible security to a legally binding treaty open for all OSCE member states to join. However, the NATO leadership resolutely turned down the proposal in its time, and flatly refused even to discuss the topic, saying that NATO members alone could aspire to legal security guarantees. I think this is a provocation aiming to break up ever greater geopolitical territories and attach them to NATO in continuation of a policy of confrontation that has brewed many critical situations in continental Europe.

We hope that the consultations on the new government that are underway at the Verkhovna Rada will finally form a cabinet with responsible attitudes to its country's destiny, and that this cabinet will take into full account the views, positions and interests of all Ukrainian regions and political forces without exception, and will be aware of its duty to guarantee stability in Europe.

The necessity of dialogue and cooperative integration processes in the European Union and the Eurasian Economic Union has become clear in the economic sphere. The military political sphere also requires a dialogue between NATO and the Collective Security Treaty Organisation, and between countries outside either organisation. It is time to stop deepening demarcation lines, to eradicate them and build the European home that was so hopefully referred to in the early 1990s.