TEHRAN, December 19. /TASS/. European countries are paying the price for Washington’s Ukraine policy, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said on Monday.

"Iran’s policy has been consistent from the very beginning of the crisis," he pointed out. "Our basic stance is about abandoning the use of force and focusing on efforts to resolve the conflict through political means. Since the very start of the crisis, we have maintained a position of active neutrality. We have emphasized that the legitimate security interests of the parties should be taken into account and ensured through dialogue," the IRNA news agency quoted the minister as saying.

The Iranian top diplomat urged that attention be paid to the roots of the Ukrainian conflict and the actions "of some players who created the preconditions for this crisis and are now fueling it, provoking one of the parties." "We can see that Europe is paying the price for the policy of the United States, who is far from [realizing] the scale of the crisis," Amir-Abdollahian noted.

On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a special military operation based on a request from the heads of the Donbass republics. In response, the West imposed major sanctions on Russia. In addition, Western countries started to provide weapons and military equipment to Kiev, whose total value is currently estimated at billions of dollars. A number of Western politicians admitted that it was actually about an economic war against Russia. Putin said on March 16 that the West’s policy towards Russia had all the signs of aggression. He pointed out that the policy to deter Russia was part of the West’s long-term strategy.