MOSCOW, October 22. /TASS/. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has blamed the crisis in Ukraine on attempts by the West to move Euro-Atlantic division lines eastwards.

“The Ukrainian crisis is a direct effect of attempts by our Western counterparts to preserve and move to the east the division lines in the Euro-Atlantic space,” he said at a meeting with members of the Youth Civic Chamber on Wednesday.

“We are against such attempts. We do not wish confrontation, but we shall be firm in defending our interests and doing what we deem right on the basis of international law. We believe that this is the optimal way of ensuring Russia’s interests," Lavrov said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned against unilateral steps in handling world problems.

“The world today is getting polycentric and multipolar,” Lavrov said. “We are witnesses to soaring competition in various spheres. The awareness of this truth should serve as a warning against attempts by one group of countries to dictate solutions to others. This has not been eradicated yet.”

In a situation where there must be common approach we see unilateral steps undermining the success of our solutions,” Lavrov said.

“Over the past few years we have been able to see what this leads to,” he went on to say. “There was the aggression against Yugoslavia, illegal intervention in Iraq, and the bombardments of Libya. Now we can see that in Syria.”