NEW YORK, March 28. /TASS/. The organizers of the second Summit for Democracy, which is set to take place virtually under US auspices later this week, are inciting participants to include anti-Russian language in the event’s concluding statement, Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov said in an interview with the Newsweek magazine that was published on Monday.
The "organizers of the second 'Summit' are vigorously inciting others to include odious anti-Russian language in the draft of the joint final declaration," the diplomat said.
"Draft texts for the upcoming meetings give the feeling that this year Washington has set a goal of shaping a human rights coalition against Russia and dragging partners into anti-Russian traps under the cover of a noble idea of developing democracy," Antonov said. "It is obvious that subsequently the drafted statement will be manifested as a common international position condemning my country for upholding national sovereignty and defending democratic freedoms of the Russian people in the east of Europe."
Antonov stated that the first forum "was characterized as the epitome of hypocrisy even by a number of observers in the West."
"Questions arose not only about the list of invited countries, many of which are considered 'undemocratic' here," Antonov said, "but also, in principle, about the ability and largely the moral right of Washington—dealing with many political and socio-economic controversies at home—to impose its canons and way of life on others," he said.
The second Summit for Democracy is set to be held virtually from March 29-30 and will be co-chaired by Zambia, South Korea, Costa Rica, the Netherlands and the US. Vedant Patel, a principal deputy spokesperson at the US Department of State, told reporters on Monday that the participants of the summit will discuss a broad range of issues including the situation around Ukraine.
The first Summit for Democracy was organized by the US and was also held virtually. The US invited 110 countries and territories to participate. They included the Chinese island of Taiwan, but not the PRC. Russia, Turkey, Egypt and some other countries weren’t invited either. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that the event primarily brought together the countries that follow in the wake of Washington's policy, as well as some of those which, while having their own vision of the world order, want to maintain good relations with the United States. The US previously said the countries that would be invited to the second summit will be roughly the same as the ones that took part in the first event.