MOSCOW, March 13. /TASS/. Western countries are still obsessed with the idea of defeating Russia, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said, referring to a recent remark made by French President Emmanuel Macron on sending NATO troops to Ukraine.

"The collective West has ultimately destroyed the European security system as it is obsessed with the idea of inflicting a strategic defeat on Russia," Lavrov said. "It would be enough to mention remarks by [French leader Emmanuel] Macron about sending NATO troops to Ukraine and quite a string of other notorious statements being made by European leaders," he added.

According to Lavrov, hostility toward Russia "is part of the West’s policy course representing a mere portion of its efforts to hamper the objective democratization of the entire system of international relations." "They understand perfectly well that exactly this issue, the issue of Western dominance in global affairs and of putting an end to its hegemony, is being resolved in Ukraine," Russia’s top diplomat said. Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed this issue in great detail in his recent sitdown with US journalist Tucker Carlson and reiterated this again in his interview with Dmitry Kiselyov, Director General of the Rossiya Segodnya media outlet, earlier on Wednesday, Lavrov added.

After a conference on Ukraine in Paris on February 26, Macron said that the participants had considered sending ground troops to Ukraine. Although no consensus was reached on this topic, he left the door open to such a scenario in the future.

After the conference, most of the participating counties stated that they have no plans to send troops to Ukraine to fight against Russia. French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne said on the following day that the presence of Western troops in Ukraine could be needed to render certain types of assistance, for instance, in mine clearance operations and training Ukrainian soldiers, but such a presence would not extend their direct participation in the conflict.