MOSCOW, November 11. /TASS/. The United Kingdom is attempting to compensate for its "rather weak military power" by trying to divide and conquer, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with Russian media including TASS.

"They [the British] are running on fumes economically, and their military power is also rather weak, including their nuclear arsenal, which they, in fact, do not have full control over," he noted. "But they need to compensate for it somehow, which they do through a traditional English desire to, putting it politely, divide and conquer everywhere."

The top Russian diplomat pointed out that the imperial ambitions of the UK can be characterized in different ways. "There is also an indecent way to describe how they behave and what goals they pursue in doing so," he remarked, alluding to 19th century Russian commander Alexander Suvorov’s famously uncharitable view of the British.

"There used to be an empire that ruled over almost the entire world. That empire no longer exists, and nor does the good old England they got used to bragging about," Lavrov concluded.