MOSCOW, March 24. /TASS/. The European Political Community, which brings together all European countries except Russia and Belarus, is destroying any remaining autonomy of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
Washington and Brussels seek "to privatize" international organizations and "make them serve their own selfish interests" in order to promote an international agenda that will benefit them, Russia’s top diplomat pointed out in an op-ed for the Razvedchik (or Intelligence Officer) magazine published on Friday.
This also concerns the OSCE, which "was created to maintain an honest pan-European dialogue." "The Westerners are actively destroying the organization’s remaining capacity, particularly by initiating the establishment of the European Political Community without Russia and Belarus," Lavrov stressed.
"The Vienna-based organization has turned into a marginalized institution managing the flood of lies that the West plans to pour on the fundamental principles of the Helsinki Final Act. Clearly, serious issues related to European security can no longer be resolved through the OSCE," Lavrov added.
He noted that similar processes were underway in the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, with the West trying to give the body authority over things it should not have power over. "The Council of Europe turning into an instrument for anti-Russian policies and, in fact, an appendage of NATO and the EU, is a link in the same chain," the Russian foreign minister said.
The European Union established the European Political Community on the initiative of French President Emmanuel Macron. Its first summit took place in October 2022.