MOSCOW, March 4./TASS/. London has consistently stuck to a rigid anti-Russian line and continues unsubstantiated attacks against Moscow, due to which bilateral relations have hit a low, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with the Russkaya Mysl magazine published in the UK.
"Over the past few years, the British government has maintained a hardnosed anti-Russian policy, accompanied by a consistent buildup of sanctions pressure," the top diplomat said. "Regardless of their EU membership, the British authorities have been consistently undertaking absolutely unwarranted attacks against us, using hardline anti-Russian rhetoric in the public spotlight. As a result, bilateral interaction has come to an end largely, trust has been lost, while the degree of relations is at a freezing point," Lavrov specified.
He reiterated that after Brexit, on three occasions, the UK slapped its own sanctions against Russian officials and organizations. Meanwhile, Moscow views Brexit as an internal affair of the United Kingdom and the European Union, he stressed.
"However, of course we are closely following the establishment of further parameters of cooperation between the UK and the EU, the influence of this process on the cooperation of Brussels and London with other international partners, and among others with our country," he went on to say.
"In the latter case, we can say for sure that Brexit has not become a factor prompting the British authorities to normalize interstate dialogue with Russia," the foreign minister concluded.
The UK left the European Union overnight to February 1, 2020. The Brexit transition ended on January 1, 2021.