MINSK, June 7. /TASS/. The Russian and Ukrainian peoples are not waging any war between themselves; in this situation, what we are seeing is sheer aggression by the United States, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev said on Wednesday.
"Ukraine is merely a tool in the hands of the West, and there is no war between the peoples of Russia and Ukraine. There is only the naked aggression of the United States. At the same time, our country is defending its people and its territories; and we are confident that we will win," Patrushev said at a meeting with his Belarusian counterpart, Alexander Volfovich.
"I would like to note that no one benefits from the continuation of the crisis around Ukraine, except for the US. Today, Washington has put the entire [continent of] Europe on its knees, forcing it to submit. Its goal is to extract the maximum benefit for its own economy by weakening the European Union, which could become one of the pillars of the multipolar world," Patrushev noted.
Against this background, "it is extremely important to consistently deepen integration within the framework of the [Russia-Belarus] Union State, the Collective Security Treaty Organization and the Eurasian Economic Union, to expand interaction with nations that are friendly toward us in order to more effectively deal with new challenges and threats," he stressed.