Russia’s top diplomat said Friday that Moscow will not start a war but warned that it wouldn’t allow the West to trample on its security interests amid fears it is planning to invade Ukraine.
“There won’t be a war as far as it depends on the Russian Federation, we don’t want a war,” Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in a live interview with Russian radio stations. “But we won’t let our interests be rudely trampled on and ignored.”
Russia has repeatedly denied having plans to invade Ukraine, but has demanded that NATO promise Ukraine will never be allowed to join and that the alliance roll back deployments of troops and military equipment in Eastern Europe.
The United States and NATO are not having it. Lavrov noted Friday that the US suggested the two sides could talk about limits on the deployment of intermediate-range missiles, restrictions on military drills and rules to prevent accidents between warships and aircraft.
While he described the US offers for dialogue on confidence-building measures as reasonable, he emphasised that Russia’s main concerns are to stop NATO’s expansion and the deployment of the alliance weapons near Russia’s borders.
