Russian FM Lavrov: Russia and the West need to sit down and talk without ultimatums

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called on Western countries to abandon ultimatums such as the peace formula proposed by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky if they are sincerely interested in peace talks.

Photo: flickr.com by Государственный департамент США, PDM

Commenting on Zelensky's idea to hold a second peace summit in one of the countries of the Global South, Sergei Lavrov noted that the next event would again be based on Zelensky's peace plan.

According to him, "it is only dreamers" in Ukraine and the West that may hope Russia will swallow the bait. Moscow will only agree to negotiations where no one will issue any ultimatums to anyone, Lavrov said.

"All these Bürgenstocks and so-called peace formulas are from the evil one. If the West is really interested — because this is not about Zelensky — if the West is interested in normalizing the situation in Europe, from which the Europeans themselves are groaning and suffering, then we need to sit down at the negotiating table calmly, without any papers in hand called the Zelensky formula, and start talking honestly,” Lavrov said, RBC reports.

The Russian Foreign Minister also accused Western countries of "discouraging” Ukraine from "normal and human” negotiations. "[The West] is doing everything to ensure that Ukraine continues the escalation, as they call it, in the hope… that we will have a breakdown and that we will do something that will allow the West, as they believe, to change the chessboard. This is not going to work out," he emphasized.

Kyiv hopes for dialogue

On August 27, speaking during a press conference, Zelensky said that Kyiv was hoping for the conflict in Ukraine to end with a dialogue.

Earlier, Ukrainian President Zelensky told Indian journalists that Ukraine was interested in holding a second peace summit in one of the countries of the Global South. The Ukrainian president said that he was holding similar discussions with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey, as well as Switzerland, where the first summit was held in July. According to him, Kyiv is open to the possibility of holding the event in India, but the problem is that the Indian delegation did not sign the final communiqué of the first summit in Bürgenstock. Pawan Kapoor, the Secretary for Western Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who represented India at the forum, explained that Delhi decided not to sign the document assuming that it would be possible to build a lasting peace only on terms that both sides would find suitable.

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Sergey Viktorovich Lavrov (Russian: Сергей Викторович Лавров; born 21 March 1950) is a Russian diplomat who has served as the foreign minister of Russia since 2004. He is the longest-serving foreign minister since the Tsarist era. Lavrov served as the permanent representative of Russia to the United Nations from 1994 to 2004.