The United States and NATO used Ukraine as a lever of pressure, by their actions bringing the situation in Europe to a critical point, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov believes. However, he expressed confidence that there would be no full-scale hostilities on the continent. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov accused the United States and NATO of making the situation in Europe critical. “It became like this through the fault of Washington and NATO, which, among other things, use Ukraine as a lever of pressure on Russia,” he said, speaking at the Valdai discussion club (quoted by TASS).
Ryabkov stressed that Moscow hopes to reach agreements on security guarantees primarily with Washington. “We would prefer to find mutual understanding and reach an agreement, first of all, with the Americans. Involving too wide a range of countries in this process seems counterproductive to us,” the Deputy Minister said.
He recalled that the Russian side publicly put forward its proposals on security guarantees in December so that everyone “who is interested in this, and there are many of them, really understand what we are talking about,” and not in order “to raise the stakes or narrow the space to maneuver" opponents.
Three rounds of talks to discuss possible guarantees took place last week in Geneva, Brussels and Vienna. “The usefulness of all these events, first of all, is that they made it possible to better understand each other's approaches and positions,” the diplomat believes.
Moscow has not yet received any answers, and because of the urgency of the question, “it is not ready to wait for them forever,” plunging into the usual diplomatic and bureaucratic “mess.”
“The ball is now clearly on the side of the United States, it was their assertive course that led to the current situation. We look forward to continuing the dialogue with the Americans on issues that are of primary interest to us," Ryabkov summed up.
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Military "feeding" of Kiev
The day before, it became known that the administration of President Joe Biden will provide Ukraine with additional military assistance in the amount of $200 million "against the growing fears about the Russian invasion." The State Department stressed that over the past year, the volume of assistance to Ukraine in the field of security exceeded the figures of all previous years (since 2014). Ryabkov urged the US to end military support for Kiev, saying such a policy posed an immediate threat to Russia.“We emphasize the need to stop feeding the militant Ukrainian regime with the supply of weapons, instructor assistance, the development of plans and their implementation for the construction of military bases, and the conduct of training events,” he said.
The Russian Foreign Ministry once again called on Washington to force Kiev to comply with the Minsk agreements if they are “really interested in a political settlement” of the conflict in Ukraine.
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War in Europe
Ryabkov expressed his confidence that there would be no full-scale hostilities in Europe, let alone Moscow. “I am sure that there is no risk of a full-scale war that could unfold in Europe or somewhere else,” the diplomat said.He reiterated that Russia has no plans to attack Ukraine or take any aggressive action against other countries.
“We will not take any action that will threaten Ukraine. We only conduct exercises, regular troop movements on our own territory,” he told reporters.
H4 USA Plus / h4 Commenting on security guarantees negotiations, in which NATO representatives also took part, the Ryabkov stressed that the Alliance recently reminds "US Plus".
“I can judge from the information that we received from Vienna and that our delegation, as they say, gathered while participating in the event in Brussels. I want to call NATO more and more “USA Plus”, such impressions are like that, ”he stated.
On Friday, January 21, representatives of the United States and Russia will return to the discussion of security guarantees: in Geneva, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will meet with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. Washington says that the upcoming new round is evidence that "diplomacy is still alive" in the context of the Ukrainian issue. The official representative of the Russian diplomatic service, Maria Zakharova, believes that by not formally refusing dialogue on guarantees, Washington is only trying to "save face."
Russia handed over its security proposals to the US and NATO on 15 December. Moscow demands guarantees from the West that the alliance will not expand to the east and that the former republics of the USSR will not be admitted to its membership.
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