The West is using the myth of an imagined Russian threat to increase the arms race, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the XXXII Assembly of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy (SWOP), TASS reports.
"The line of restoring the size and combat capability of the armies of the European states, moving the military-industrial complexes of the NATO countries into war mode has been applied, and work has begun, so far it is conceptual, on the outlines of the creation of a European military alliance with a nuclear component," he said. According to Lavrov, Russia will protect its interests in the Ukrainian direction and in relations with the West.
"Almost all foreign partners in the world with whom we communicate understand this," he said. According to the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry, the organizers of the summit on the issue of Ukraine in Switzerland are engaged in "blatant nonsense" that "have no prospects".
Russia perceives the increase in the West's supply of long-range weapons to Ukraine as a signal that they are not ready for serious talks, he added.
"This means that they have made a choice in favor of confrontation on the battlefield," Sergey Lavrov said.
