PHNOM PENH, August 5. /TASS/. The US moves to create narrow pacts like AUKUS (Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States) are aimed at promoting NATO’s interests in the Indo-Pacific region, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Friday.
"The open formats of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) that operate on the basis of a consensus and mutual respect are endangered by the activity, which the United States and its closest allies are undertaking to create narrow-format structures here, including military-political pacts, as in the case with the so-called AUKUS trio," Russia’s top diplomat pointed out.
"There is a clearly observed trend of using AUKUS for promoting NATO’s interests in the Indo-Pacific region," Lavrov stressed.
The North Atlantic alliance does not even conceal its intents, Russia’s top diplomat said.
"At its Madrid summit in June this year, the North Atlantic alliance proclaimed NATO’s global responsibility in the sphere of security and advanced the concept of indivisible security of the EuroAtlantics and the Indo-Pacific region," Lavrov said.
"And, of course, in these activities [the United States and NATO] they are actively using militarist sentiments that manifest themselves in present-day Japan," the foreign minister stressed.
"Japan, and also New Zealand and Australia are being actively pulled into the activity associated with expanding NATO’s military infrastructure to embrace the region, in which we are located, with logistics chains being established here for the needs of NATO’s military activity," Russia’s top diplomat said.