FROM EIR DAILY ALERT
Russia’s Foreign Minister Lavrov Warns, Conflict Potential Increased Worldwide in 2018
Jan. 16, 2019 (EIRNS)—During his remarks today prior to answering the media questions at a news conference on the results of Russian diplomacy in 2018, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the international situation remained tense.
“The conflict potential increased last year, primarily because of the stubborn unwillingness of some Western countries led by the United States to accept the realities of the objectively developing multipolar world, as well as because of their desire to continue to force their will on others by means of pressure and economic and propaganda instruments.”
He pointed out that there had been “attempt to replace the universal norms of international law with a ‘rules-based order.’ This term was recently coined to “camouflage a striving to invent rules depending on changes in the political situation so as to be able to put pressure on disagreeable states and often even on allies,” he said. The transcript in English is reported on the Russian Foreign Ministry website.
He said Russia continues to pursue a multidirectional foreign policy focused on protecting Russia’s national interests. “We worked to strengthen the positive trends on the international stage, to find collective solutions based on international law to the problems all countries are facing, and ultimately to promote a fairer and more democratic polycentric world order in keeping with objective modern realities. Towards this end, we closely cooperated with our allies and partners at the CSTO, the EAEU, the CIS, BRICS and the SCO, as well as working constructively in the key global governance bodies, primarily the UN and G20.
