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Drills of Russia, China, South Africa create no challenges for global community — diplomat

Russian Ambassador to South Africa Ilya Rogachev advised "some people" to calm down and get used to the fact that certain events in the world are happening "against their will"

MOSCOW, February 8. /TASS/. Joint military exercises, to be held by Russia, China and South Africa later this month, are not creating any challenges for the international community, Russia’s ambassador to South Africa has said.

"The exercises will not continue for ten days, between February 17 and 27, as the Western media have been portraying them. They will take a lot less time, literally two days. And they create no challenges whatsoever for the international community - not in the military sense, not in the political one, not from the point of view of violating any norms of the international law," Ambassador Ilya Rogachev told Russia’s Channel One on Tuesday evening.

The diplomat advised "some people" to calm down and get used to the fact that certain events are taking place worldwide "in spite of their will and without their approval".

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on February 23 that the joint drills that Russia, China and South Africa will hold in the Indian Ocean in February are transparent and do not violate any norms of the international law. Speaking at a press conference following talks with South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor, Lavrov expressed confusion about the negative reaction that the upcoming exercise had caused in the West.

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