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West focusing energy on breaking up socio-economic unity in CIS — Lavrov

"The West’s key concern and its primary anti-Russian energy are centered on the post-Soviet space," the Russian top diplomat said

MOSCOW, December 13. /TASS/. The West is making a concerted effort to undermine unity between Russia and other CIS countries, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the Federation Council.

"The West’s key concern and its primary anti-Russian energy are centered on the post-Soviet space," Russia’s top diplomat said. "Their priority is to try and disrupt ties between former Soviet republics," Lavrov said, as he referred to economic ties, cooperation between law enforcement agencies and the common security system within the framework of the Commonwealth of Independent States.

According to Lavrov, Western institutions, NGOs and various foundations for democracy under the aegis of the Agency for International Development, fully backed by Washington have been making attempts to introduce their donor programs exactly in those spheres.

"We have been discussing this openly with our allies," the minister continued. "In our view, the majority of them are well aware of the West’s intentions. And we understand that they would not like to quarrel with Western countries. We would have hated to quarrel with the West, too, had it not unleashed a war on us," he emphasized.

"We have been mostly making efforts to <…> fight back against these intentions," Lavrov concluded as he assured senators that Russian President Vladimir Putin could clearly see the task at hand and that Russia would move towards completing it.

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Foreign policy Sergey Lavrov

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