MOSCOW, September 8. /TASS/. The inability of Western countries to draw lessons from centuries of history about the impossibility of subjugating Russia is striking, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

"I am struck that the West cannot learn from centuries of history regarding its repeated attempts to rein in, subjugate, and punish Russia," the foreign minister stated, speaking to the students and faculty of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO).

"They have picked the wrong target," he emphasized.

In this context, Lavrov noted that it was not Russia that "severed relations with the West." "Eurasia is a single, the largest and the richest continent," he pointed out (continued). "A continent where the greatest human civilizations have lived, developed, and continue to exist, preserving their traditions, as I have already said, and identity, and further developing their identity. It is not our principle to isolate ourselves behind a wall from any part of this continent. Therefore, we always proceed from the understanding that the processes of shaping a large Eurasian partnership will remain open to the western part of our continent."

According to him, this will become possible when the West "finally stops considering itself the golden billion and stops seeing itself as a flourishing garden surrounded by jungles." "You all know how modest these people are and how they reason about history and their current place in the world. Life will teach them," Lavrov assured.