At the OSCE summit in Malta, his first trip to a European Union country since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Russian Foreign Minister was called a “war criminal” by his Ukrainian counterpart .
The meeting was unprecedented since the start of the war in Ukraine and quickly turned into an exchange of violent accusations.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov traveled to Malta on Thursday for his first visit to a European Union country since his country’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 to attend a meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Upon his arrival, he accused the West of rekindling the Cold War and provoking direct conflict with Moscow. Measures pushed according to him by the United States, and motivated by the desire to “bring NATO back to the forefront of politics”.
The foreign ministers of Ukraine, Poland and Estonia left the room when Sergei Lavrov began speaking. Before his departure, the head of Ukrainian diplomacy, Andrii Sybiha, described his Russian counterpart as “war criminal”while questioning Russia’s presence at this meeting.
“Russia is not a partner, it is the greatest threat to our common security. Russia’s participation in the OSCE is a threat to cooperation in Europe”declared Mr. Sybiha during the meeting of the 57 members of the body responsible for security and human rights. Ukraine boycotted last year’s OSCE summit in Skopje, North Macedonia, due to Lavrov’s presence.
Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, a close ally of Kyiv, supported Sybiha’s remarks and issued a warning to the Russian delegation during his summit speech. “You are trying to rebuild the Russian Empire and we will not let you. We will resist you all the way.”said Mr. Sikorski.
Antony Blinken, who spoke after Lavrov left the room, placed responsibility for the escalation in the region on Russia. He cited the deployment of North Korean forces in Europe, the use of an intermediate-range ballistic missile to attack Ukraine and Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
“I regret that our colleague Mr. Lavrov left the room, not having had the courtesy to listen to us as we listened to his. And of course, our Russian colleague is very good at drowning listeners in a tsunami of disinformation “said Mr. Blinken. “Mr Lavrov spoke about the sovereign right of each Member State to make its own choices. This is exactly what it is about: the sovereign right of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people to make their own choices for “future, without these choices being made in Moscow and by Moscow.”
Mr. Lavrov and Mr. Blinken were not expected to meet at this event.
Mr Blinken had traveled to Malta from Brussels, where he attended his final NATO meeting of the outgoing Mr Biden administration. US President-elect Donald Trump, who takes office on January 20, says he could end the war in Ukraine “in one day”sparking fears that Washington could cut aid to kyiv and cede territory to Russia as part of a peace deal.
The OSCE is the successor to a body created in 1975 to facilitate relations between the Soviet Union and the West during the Cold War. It sends observers to monitor conflicts and elections around the world and helps its members coordinate on issues ranging from arms control to human rights.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the organization has been paralyzed by Moscow’s use of its veto to block several important decisions. Last year, Mr. Lavrov said that the OSCE was “essentially becoming an appendage of NATO and the EU”.
