Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s statement and answers to media questions during a joint news conference following talks with Foreign Minister of the Hellenic Republic Nikos Dendias, Moscow, February 18, 2022
We have had good talks. It is good that we can maintain a regular trust-based dialogue despite the pandemic restrictions and other developments in our common region. As we have established, this is our fifth meeting over the past couple of years.
We regard Athens as our reliable partner in Europe. Today we had an in-depth discussion on current bilateral issues in the context of the agreements reached during a meeting President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had in December 2021, as well as the practical steps taken to implement the decisions of that summit, including the Joint Action Plan for 2022-2024.
We pointed out that bilateral trade grew by over 67 percent to $4.5 billion in 2021 despite the pandemic. This is a record high since 2013. We hope that this trend will persist in the context of Russian investors and their Greek partners’ plans for the future, and also within the framework of the Joint Russian-Greek Commission for Economic, Industrial, Scientific and Technical Cooperation, which convened in Moscow in November 2021. It will hold its 14th meeting in Greece in 2022.
We emphasised the positive trend in supplying Greece with Russian natural gas. Russia covers more than 40 percent of its Greek partners’ natural gas needs. We believe that the recently signed additional agreement to the corresponding contract until 2026 will help strengthen Greece’s energy security. We noted the reliability of deliveries of this type of fuel from Russia to Greece.
We outlined our further steps to develop our contractual legal framework. An entire range of agreements and contracts in practical spheres of exchanges between our countries’ civil societies and professional communities are being drafted.
Good interaction has been established in the emergency response sphere. Russian aviation proved its effectiveness and reliability when putting out major wildfires in Greece in the summer of 2021. We reaffirmed our readiness to further provide all the necessary assistance to our partners to combat natural disasters and help increase their potential in this area.
We have a rich tradition of cultural exchanges popular among our people. The Year of History, held under the patronage of the Russian President and the Prime Minister of the Hellenic Republic, continues. In line with our leaders’ agreement, we will start preparations for the closing ceremony of this cross-year for mid-2022. The opening ceremony took place in Greece. The closing ceremony is expected to be held in the Russian Federation. We are interested in holding more of these events and agreed to choose the theme for other cross-years.
We are also interested in developing cooperation with Greece as well as other European countries in countering the novel coronavirus infection and overcoming the pandemic’s consequences. This would help to further promote our ties in tourism and resume regular flights. Last year, over 170,000 Russians visited Greece despite the pandemic.
We have agreed to continue to maintain regular contact between our foreign ministries. We have a schedule of consultations. We talked about the situation in
You know the content of our materials, including extensive material which describes the situation in detail and our assessment of the position of the West. Yesterday, it was forwarded to US officials.
We reviewed several regional crises, including the situation in the southeast of Ukraine, and emphasised that there was no alternative to carrying out the Minsk agreements consistently and in full. We expressed our serious concern about statements that Kiev continues to make regarding its position to not engage in direct dialogue with Donetsk and Lugansk. This is a direct challenge and a refusal to implement the Minsk Agreements.
We discussed the situation in the Eastern Mediterranean, the settlement process in
The talks were extensive and useful. We appreciate an opportunity like this to compare our assessments and ideas of how progress on a number of conflict situations can be achieved.
The talks were useful. I want to thank my colleague and friend, and all members of his delegation.
Question (retranslated from Greek, addressed to Nikos Dendias): Recently Turkey has been doubting the sovereignty of the Greek islands. What is Greece’s line of argument? How does Athens respond?
Sergey Lavrov (speaking after Nikos Dendias): I would like to reaffirm our position that all disputes, including the one between Greece and Turkey, must be settled on the firm foundation of international law, above all on the principles envisaged in the UN conventions on international law, including the achievement of mutual agreement between the parties to the dispute. We will be ready to do everything we can to help create the conditions for such a settlement process.
Mr Dendias said that someone could try to take advantage of the current situation, when all eyes are riveted on another country (meaning Ukraine). It is necessary to voice these concerns to the Western allies, because all eyes are precisely riveted on the hype that they created over nothing in an effort to promote their geopolitical interests.
Question (addressed to Nikos Dendias): Do you see any conditions for resuming full-format talks on a Cyprus settlement under the auspices of the UN and with guarantor countries in the near future? Are there any obstacles to this?
Sergey Lavrov (speaking after Nikos Dendias): I would like to reaffirm our position that it is necessary to settle the Cyprus problem based on the UN Security Council resolution. Speaking about international guarantees, we have suggested for many years now that the UN Security Council permanent members that initiated the corresponding resolutions should act as the guarantors of their implementation.
Question (retranslated from Greek): It is common knowledge that the situation in Donbass has deteriorated because of ceasefire violations. Can the threat of a Ukrainian invasion of Donbass be regarded as a casus belli?
Sergey Lavrov: We are alarmed by the recent reports of a spike in shelling attacks with the use of weapons prohibited by the Minsk agreements. I would like to point out in this connection that the Kiev regime has been grossly violating its obligations for many years. Every time we coordinate additional ceasefire measures, Kiev sabotages them.
The most notorious case, which the Normandy format countries and other concerned representatives have noticed, has to do with the Agreement on Additional Measures to Ensure Comprehensive, Sustainable, Unlimited Ceasefire reached in July 2020. Under it, Kiev, Donetsk and Lugansk pledged to respond to an offensive operation with retaliatory fire only after reporting the incident to their command, which will take decisions on further actions. This provision was coordinated by the parties. They agreed that respective orders should be issued. Donetsk and Lugansk have issued them. Ukraine procrastinated for nearly a year. And it did not comply with the coordinated procedure in practice either.
Kiev was forced to issue this order, with the support from Germany and France. However, the commander of the Special Operations Forces in Donbass announced that commanders on the ground have the right to return fire at their own decision, as they always did. When we mention this glaring example to our German, French and other colleagues, who try to cover up for Kiev, they have nothing to say to that.
Under the Minsk agreements, the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) has a special role to play. Initially, the SMM acted objectively. But later it tried to camouflage the events in its updates. For example, it did not say which party violated the ceasefire or deliberately targeted the civilian sector, which led to destruction and civilian casualties. It was only three years ago that the SMM issued a report, due to our persistent efforts and despite Kiev’s efforts to prevent this, which indicated who was affected by the ceasefire violations and how. It turned out that destruction in the civilian sector and civilian casualties were three times greater in the self-defence regions than in the government-controlled regions.
We have taken note that the recent SMM updates no longer include this information, but only mention increased attacks and destruction. The SMM does not indicate the party that conducts more attacks or the regions with the most destruction. We will continue our efforts to ensure that this information is provided to the OSCE member states regularly, and that it names the party responsible for ceasefire violations and the targets of attacks. We will demand that this is done. So far, we can see that the SMM is doing its best to avoid any indication of guilt of the Ukrainian armed forces.
Question (retranslated from Greek, addressed to Nikos Dendias): You have met with members of the Greek diaspora who live on the contact line in Ukraine. Did you find common ground on the matter of these people during your talks with Sergey Lavrov?
Sergey Lavrov (speaking after Nikos Dendias): Greeks are living not only in Mariupol or Donbass, but also in Crimea, which is Russian. We would be delighted to organise trips for Greek representatives so that they can meet their compatriots there.
Question: President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky said a global document is needed with guarantees of Ukraine’s security signed by Russia and the US, among others. What does Moscow think about this initiative?
Sergey Lavrov: If it concerns Ukraine’s security and ways to achieve it, I would like to refer you to the press conference by the Presidents of Russia and France, Vladimir Putin and Emmanuel Macron, following their talks in the Kremlin.
Vladimir Putin convincingly and in detail explained why providing for Ukraine’s security through its accession to NATO was unacceptable for Russia and would be a direct encroachment on Russia’s own security. We believe other ways can be sought to ensure security not only for Ukraine but also for all the countries in our region, including the Russian Federation.
The search for these ways is part of our initiative (we talked about this today), and we are discussing it with the US. But it does not imply unilateral concessions on the part of the Russian Federation as a method to ensure its security. The right method is to agree on the principles that will guarantee the security of all parties, including in the eastern Mediterranean. We are ready to discuss such options – not the security of Ukraine just because today Vladimir Zelensky got this new whim (yesterday, all he spoke about was joining NATO), but the security of all countries in the OSCE region, security put on a solid foundation of documents signed at the top level and setting out the indivisibility of security in the full sense of this fundamental principle.
We are ready for this work. This is actually the essence of our initiative. However, it does not exclude the implementation of the Minsk accords in any way, but, on the contrary, implies Kiev’s good-faith implementation of the Package of Measures. It is against this background that Kiev continues to make statements to the effect that the Minsk accords are stillborn documents, that they are “unrealisable,” since they were signed “without regard for Ukraine’s interests,” and that any dialogue with Donetsk and Lugansk is “out of the question,” since “they do not decide anything.” Mr Zelensky is probablyfamiliar with a situation where a party to negotiations does not decide anything, for decisions are made for him by those who manage him from the outside.
We advocate comprehensive security guarantees for our entire common region. At the same time, we insist that our Western colleagues influential with the Kiev regime step up the effort to compel them to fulfil their obligations under the Minsk accords.