MOSCOW, April 4. /TASS/. Russia is viewing the European Union as an unfriendly association now, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with aif.ru posted on the Foreign Ministry’s website on Tuesday.

"The European Union has ‘lost’ Russia. However, it is its own making. Exactly the EU member-states and leaders of the Union openly state the need of inflicting the strategic defeat to Russia, as they say. They are filling the criminal Kiev regime with weapons and munitions and send instructors and mercenaries to Ukraine. These are the reasons why we consider the EU to be the unfriendly association," Lavrov said.

The Russian side made necessary conclusions from this situation, the minister stressed. Moscow will act in response to hostile steps "decidedly if necessary, being governed by national interests of Russia and the reciprocity principle commonly adopted in the diplomatic practice," he added.