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Ukrainian peace activists should keep in mind Kiev's ban on dialogue with Russia — Lavrov

The Russian foreign minister recalled that in September 2022, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky signed a decree banning all Ukrainian officials from negotiating with Russian President Vladimir Putin's government

NIZHNY NOVGOROD, June 11. /TASS/. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has urged all authors of peace initiatives on Ukraine to remember that Kiev has banned itself to conduct dialogue with Moscow.

"Those who are now trying to promote some initiatives to start negotiation processes, I would ask them to pay attention to two key circumstances. First, don't forget that in September 2022, [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky signed a decree banning all Ukrainian officials from negotiating with [Russian President] Vladimir Putin's government. And in early May 2024, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry made an official statement that Ukraine does not recognize Vladimir Putin as a democratically elected, legitimate president," he said at a press conference following a meeting of BRICS Foreign Ministers.

"Secondly, those who promote initiatives, say the right things about the indivisibility of security, the inadmissibility of creating blocs, the need to understand the root causes, should still, when developing their approaches, take full account of the fact that Ukraine has completely banned the Russian language by law in flagrant violation of all conceivable international conventions on the rights of national minorities," the foreign minister added.

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