MOSCOW, May 2. /TASS/. Russia plans to continue cooperating with the United States and Western Europe on countering modern challenges and threats if the partners want to "join these efforts," Kremlin Chief of Staff Sergei Ivanov has said in an interview with RT.
Ivanov reminded that the United Nations "was organized after the war, and it’s still the main international organ responsible for security." "And the UN as such was devised to prevent repeating something like Nazism and world wars generally," he said.
"Since then, a lot of water has passed under the bridge, but the new challenges and new threats like terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, regional conflicts - they are still on the agenda," Ivanov said.
"And Russia is definitely an active part of trying to solve those problems, but solving together with the United States, with Western Europe. And we would never change our principal approach to those problems. We will continue, if the other partner wants to join efforts, to work together," he added.
Ivanov said Iran is a "good example" that this approach has been efficient and the framework agreement reached in Lausanne, Switzerland, in early April on the settlement of Iran’s nuclear issue "is a huge breakthrough," he stressed.
Speaking about the current situation in Libya, Ivanov said this is a negative example of policy of a number of countries acting against the UN will.
"As for the Middle East, you must remember what happened in Libya, for example. There was no UN resolution allowing to bomb Libya. And now, we face hypocritical efforts to stop illegal immigration from the coast of Libya to Italy, for example. What was the principle cause, which started this illegal immigration? The bombing of Libya. Now, European countries face the results of their own policy," he said.
"It’s dreadful of course, dreadful to see those TV pictures of hundreds of people drowned," Ivanov said speaking about the recent refugee shipwreck in the Mediterranean that resulted in many deaths.
"But the principle reason of this illegal immigration was because Libya was bombed, and Gaddafi was killed. Because when Gaddafi was alive there was no illegal immigration," he said.