MOSCOW, June 30. /TASS/. The West is seeking to obstruct Moscow and Beijing’s efforts to bolster the ranks of like-minded countries, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told an online briefing on Friday.
"The [West’s] goals are to stop Russia and China and others from strengthening the ranks of like-minded nations, obstruct the expansion of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa - TASS) group and the rise in its global authority, and undermine integrative processes across Eurasia within the Eurasian Economic Union [EAEU], CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States], CSTO [Collective Security Treaty Organization], Shanghai Cooperation Organization [SCO], ASEAN [Association of Southeast Asian Nations] and the One Belt One Road initiative," the top diplomat pointed out.
Lavrov noted that the global majority "does not want to live by Western rules, but stands for the universal norms of international law, especially those enshrined in the United Nations Charter." "The task that we have set for ourselves, which is shared by the overwhelming majority of countries, is to ensure the full implementation of all of the principles outlined in the UN Charter without exception," the Russian foreign minister stressed.
According to Lavrov, the sovereign equality of countries is the main principle of the UN Charter, for which there is no alternative and on which the global organization is based. "The West has always ignored this principle; in launching all of its actions, it has probably never thought about the existence of this particular requirement of the UN Charter," Lavrov maintained.