US wants European NATO states to ‘contain Russia’ – Lavrov

The West is becoming increasingly divided as its power wanes, the Russian foreign minister has said

The US is trying to shift the burden of “containing Russia” onto European NATO members, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said.

Speaking during a visit to China on Wednesday, Lavrov blamed the EU and UK for “torpedoing” US-Russian talks aimed at normalizing diplomatic ties and criticized large-scale European rearmament programs.

“European elites see militarization as a guarantee of their survival. And Americans encourage this European militarization as it shifts responsibility for security of the Old World,” he said.

Washington is content for European states to bankroll Kiev against Moscow and even create a new military bloc involving Ukraine, as this places “the main responsibility [on them] for containing Russia,” Lavrov said.

According to the diplomat, the broader Western agenda is to “preserve and renew their hegemony” and put in place new tools to make sure they “live at the expense of others” – as slavery and colonialism did in the past. But as their relative power declines, internal frictions in the West intensify, he said.

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Lavrov criticized the EU for prioritizing ideology over economic pragmatism by refusing Russian energy supplies despite a global price shock caused by the US war on Iran.

“Europe says it is getting off the needle of Russian oil and gas. And it risks getting impaled by an aspen stake, which [the US] is actively sharpening for the Europeans,” he said.

The top Russian diplomat stated that officials in Brussels, Paris, Berlin, and London are making efforts to prolong the Ukraine conflict and keep the US involved in it. They have largely nullified the outcome of US-Russian negotiations in Alaska last year, even as President Donald Trump has moved away from his predecessor’s policy of open-ended support for Kiev, Lavrov said.

Moscow has no illusions about the fact that the US pursues dominance over global energy markets, including through recent military operations against Venezuela and Iran and the continuation of sanctions on Russia, the minister concluded.