MOSCOW, May 18. /TASS/. Russia remains open to dialogue on security and strategic stability with the West but only on equal terms, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
"As the [Russian] president said, we remain open to dialogue with the West, particularly on the issues of security and strategic stability. However, it should not be a conversation from a position of strength and one’s own exceptionalism but should be conducted on equal terms, based on respect for each other’s interests," he noted at the 32nd Assembly of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy.
Lavrov pointed out that those issues should be considered in their entirety. According to him, Western officials often pull out certain aspects on which Russia does not agree with them and accuse Moscow of lacking a constructive approach.
"In the current situation, it’s only right for us to boost cooperation with the countries of the global majority who are unwilling to sacrifice their relations with us - which are mutually beneficial and based on the historical memory - for the sake of the West’s geopolitical escapade in Ukraine," the top Russian diplomat concluded.
The West is using the myth about the Russian threat to build a new military alliance in Europe and accelerate an arms race, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
"There is a policy underway to restore the size and combat readiness of European armies, put the defense industry of NATO countries on wartime footing and work has begun, so far confined to deliberations, on the contours of forming a European military alliance with a nuclear component," he said.
Lavrov also said the West reconsidered NATO membership as a reliable guarantee of security after the start of the special military operation.
"Now the rhetoric is completely opposite: ‘Putin will defeat Ukraine and then attack NATO, so everyone needs to urgently arm themselves to the teeth,’" he went on to say.
According to the minister, France is the most vocal in this regard. French President Emmanuel Macron "confessed in a recent interview that Paris and Berlin had always seen Russia as the main threat," Lavrov said.