LONDON, December 12. /TASS/. The Russian Embassy in London issued a statement in connection with the ‘inappropriate statements’ of British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly, who accused Iran of supplying military equipment to Russia.
"We categorically reject recent comments by UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly, who, following in the footsteps of US representatives, accused the Russian Federation and Iran of some ‘sordid’ deals in the context of the Ukrainian crisis. The UK side is well aware that allegations regarding supposed Iranian military supplies to Russia, ostensibly carried out in exchange for Russian military-technical support, completely lack factual basis. Russia, unlike our Western opponents, is invariably committed to complying with national legislation and international law in its cooperation with third countries," the document said, "Talking about ‘sordid’ transactions, James Cleverly ought to be reminded of, above all, the massive military-technical, financial and propaganda assistance provided by Great Britain and its Western allies to the Kiev regime."
The embassy stressed that pumping Ukraine with Western weapons "in breach of fundamental norms of export control" only helped to prolong hostilities and increase civilian casualties as the Ukrainian armed forces used the military equipment received "for de-facto terrorist strikes against civilian targets" on Russian territory.
"London is naturally quite well aware of all this. However, such facts invariably fail to find their way into the local media mainstream, while British officials are timidly silent about them. One should ask, however, whether such systemic hypocrisy with regard to Ukraine isn’t emblematic of exactly the kind of ‘sordid’ double-deal that James Cleverly seems to be concerned about?" the embassy noted, "For our part, we are carefully recording all instances of London’s and other Western capitals’ involvement in the financial encouragement and arming of the Kiev regime, as well as in planning military actions against Russian facilities and military personnel. Naturally such criminal acts will have specific legal consequences for all those involved."
UN Security Council resolution
The embassy also drew attention to Cleverly's "utterly unfounded speculations" that Iran, which allegedly supplied arms to Russia, violated UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which prohibited "the supply of any missile-related goods, equipment, technology and components."
"If London is indeed concerned about its implementation, the UK leadership should focus its attention on the actions of the true violator of the Resolution - the United States, whose unilateral withdrawal from the ‘nuclear deal’ has become the very challenge to global security, about which our UK colleagues pretend to care," the embassy pointed out.
Cleverly said on Friday that the UK found the military cooperation between Russia and Iran deeply worrying. According to the minister, this partnership allegedly posed a threat to global security. He claimed that Iran became one of Russia's main arms suppliers during the conflict in Ukraine, providing Moscow with hundreds of its drones.