Lavrov at the Knowledge Marathon

Updated to fix untranslated section.

You had to know Lavrov wouldn’t let this invitation go to waste. Yes, he looks fatigued in his photo, but his words are energetic. If you read the previous entry about this event, you’ll know its sponsors and uniqueness. His approach was similar to Maria Zakharova’s as he wanted interaction, which is where mentoring performs best. The reason his performance is provided in full is thanks to the MFA for producing the transcript. And now Lavrov:

Good afternoon

I am grateful for another invitation. This is a useful format, which, I hope, helps young people to get acquainted with foreign policy. But it also helps us to better understand the aspirations and attitudes that are now present among the younger generation. To be honest, we take them into account to a large extent when formulating further directions for the development of our foreign policy.

I will not talk at length about how the situation in world politics is developing. It has indeed entered a new stage of its development and is experiencing tectonic shifts associated with the fact that a multipolar world order is taking shape. It is clear that its contours have not yet been definitively determined. But it is clear that the new global architecture will not be subordinated to a single hegemon. It will be truly democratic and fair.

The polycentricity or multipolarity that we are now witnessing that is taking shape before our eyes is truly all-encompassing. In Eurasia, the Asia-Pacific region, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America, new global decision-making centers are emerging and strengthening their positions. These are states such as Russia, China, and India. These are associations: BRICS, SCO. All of them, not in words but in deeds, demonstrate independence, put their own interests and state sovereignty at the forefront and do not want to live under anyone's dictation. On the contrary, they want to rely on their own traditions, culture and way of life, and advocate the democratization of interstate relations and a fairer distribution of global benefits among all members of the international community.

If we take the examples that President of Russia Vladimir Putin spoke about not so long ago, today China is the "first economy" in terms of purchasing power parity, and the aggregate gross domestic product of the BRICS countries (by the same parameters) exceeds that of the G2022 member countries. At the end of <>, despite sanctions and gloomy predictions, Russia rose to fifth place in the global economy, ahead of Germany. The numbers speak for themselves.

Polarity manifests itself not only in the economic sphere, but also in the framework of multilateral diplomacy. The most striking example is BRICS, where countries representing different civilisations, religions and different macro-regions cooperate effectively on a mutually beneficial basis in a variety of areas, from politics and security to the economy, finance, culture and sports. Such cooperation is based on the principles of equality, mutual respect and balance of interests.

It is not surprising that many states are trying to establish ties with the BRICS. At the last summit in South Africa in August of this year, a historic expansion took place. From January 1, 2024, six more countries will join the list of participants - Argentina, Egypt, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Ethiopia.

Similar processes are observed in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. There is also no mentoring, leaders, followers, students, teachers. The SCO is also expanding. There are many people who want to join this structure.

Today, BRICS and the SCO are key pillars of the emerging multipolar world order. It is clear that the "collective West," led by the United States, is trying to reverse these objective trends. It is accustomed to solving its own problems at the expense of others, exploiting other people's resources, and, as President Vladimir Putin said, "extracting the hegemon's rent." In spite of all objective processes, they still cherish the hope of ruling the world, telling other countries with whom and how to develop ties, and grossly interfering in the internal affairs of sovereign states. In fact, they are trying to deny the countries of the world majority the right to their own path of development.

The methods by which the U.S. and its satellites are trying to operate are well known. These are attempts to sow chaos in various regions of the world, to divide countries and peoples, and to exacerbate inter-ethnic and inter-religious contradictions. Now we see how the Anglo-Saxons are literally pushing the Middle East to the brink of a major war. This line is fully manifested in other regions, including Ukraine.

There are many examples, but the result is the same: the loss or weakening of statehood, as was the case with Iraq, Libya, and the Syrian Arab Republic. In fact, statehood is in question in Ukraine as well. Other results of this policy are a surge in terrorism and extremism, broken human destinies, destroyed families, and multi-million refugee flows.

Attempts to weaken Russia in order to deprive us of geopolitical subjectivity and push us to the margins of world politics do not stop. The illusory nature of such hopes is obvious to everyone.

The policy of containment is also being pursued in relation to China, Iran, as well as any country that is able to compete with the Westerners on certain issues. We have no doubt that such a destructive policy of "reviving Western domination" is doomed.

Multipolarity is becoming a reality. Many Western politicians admit this (albeit "through gritted teeth"). Clearly, this will not be a one-time event. This will be a historically long process. It is important that the new polycentric architecture is sustainable and reflects the aspirations of the entire global community. President Vladimir Putin spoke about this in detail at a meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club.

I would like to emphasise that we are not faced with the task of starting from scratch and canceling out everything that has been worked out by our predecessors. There is a normative foundation for building a new world. It is durable and reliable. That is the Charter of the United Nations. The main thing is to prevent the devaluation of its principles and (together with our like-minded people) to ensure compliance with these principles and their application in their entirety and interconnection. Of course, we are in favour of adapting the world organisation itself to modern geopolitical realities. Life is moving forward, and that is fully true of the reform of the Security Council. This is being done by eliminating the underrepresentation of the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America in this body.

In addition to the return of the UN to its origins and to the principles agreed upon by the founding fathers, other multilateral structures should become a significant support for the emerging multipolarity. First of all, the BRICS, the SCO, as well as the Union State of Russia and Belarus, the CSTO, the EAEU, the CIS, ASEAN, the African Union, the Central League of Arab States, and the GCC.

We are witnessing positive developments in Eurasia aimed at aligning the potentials of various regional initiatives, including the Eurasian Economic Union and China's Belt and Road Initiative. All this contributes to the formation of the Greater Eurasian Partnership, which was predicted by President Vladimir Putin back in 2015.

There is no question of any international isolation, which was predicted for us. We cooperate with the world's majority countries, which make up 85% of the world's population. All people in these countries (the overwhelming majority of them) see Russia as a good friend, a faithful partner who has repeatedly proved his reliability and who is doing a lot to build interstate communication based on the universally recognised norms of international law.

Central to these norms is the principle of the UN Charter on the sovereign equality of all states, large and small. At the same time, we remain open to a pragmatic dialogue with Western countries if they show their readiness (in deed, not in words) to take into account our interests and interact on the basis of mutual benefit and respect. Sooner or later, they will realize the futility of this anti-Russian course. The question is not for us, but for the current generation of leaders, primarily European countries, who have clearly lost their strategic vision and are blindly following in the wake of the pernicious American line.

Let's move on to interactive communication. It's always productive.

Question: What tasks does Russia set for itself as one of the centres of the multipolar world that is currently taking shape?

Sergey Lavrov: The tasks were set by President Vladimir Putin. I have also briefly listed them today. They are simple – for the world to be just. There is no need to invent anything here. The sovereign equality of states, as enshrined in the UN Charter, the implementation of all agreements and decisions of the Security Council. This, too, is part of international law.

The West interprets the principles of the UN Charter selectively. In the case of Crimea, where an open referendum was held, attended by hundreds of foreign observers, the West did not recognize the results, saying that the problem of Crimea should be resolved on the basis of respect for the territorial integrity of Ukraine. In the case of Kosovo, the principle of territorial integrity was ignored. Although there was no referendum there, they simply declared the independence of this Serbian province, saying that the main support for such a decision was the principle that peoples have the right to self-determination.

Both of these principles are enshrined in the UN Charter: the right of peoples to self-determination and respect for territorial integrity. Taking into account the contradictions that arose in the application of these two key postulates, the General Assembly adopted a special declaration in 1970, in which it clearly stated. This was adopted by consensus. The document is called the Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Cooperation among States in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations. It unequivocally stresses that it is the duty of all to respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of those States whose Governments respect the principle of self-determination of peoples and thus represent the entire population living in the territory concerned.

No one needs to prove that the Kiev regime, which was established after the bloody coup d'état in February 2014, did not represent either the Crimeans or the population of eastern Ukraine. When this regime seized power, the first thing it did was to abolish the relevant laws of Ukraine, which guaranteed the Russian language the rights of the Russian language. This is what caused the immediate reaction of the people of Crimea and Donbass. There are many such examples.

We are talking about the need to apply the UN Charter not as God puts it on the soul (and on the Western soul, if they still have it), but in its entirety and interconnection.

Question: Russia is a self-sufficient state that never refuses to cooperate with other countries. How do you manage to observe that very line and negotiate and talk without sacrificing your sovereignty?

Sergey Lavrov: We are succeeding. It is safe to say that over the past ten years, we have gained the ability to develop relations with other states without sacrificing our sovereignty and without endangering our security, Russia's socioeconomic development prospects, or the growth of people's well-being. Ever since the West began to impose unprecedented sanctions against us. They've always existed. But their ferocity and all-encompassing were fully manifested after the West provoked a coup d'état in Ukraine, wanting to bring to power there a government with openly neo-Nazi views, which was destined to destroy everything Russian and create direct threats to the security of our country on the territory of Ukraine.

Prior to that, after the formation of the Russian Federation, when the Soviet Union disappeared, we were open to cooperation, primarily with the West, seeing it as its closest neighbor (China is also such, but our main population lives in the European part), a source of technology, progressive forms of development of society and international relations. We are deeply disappointed in this.

We opposed the West's attempts to directly damage our interests, when NATO approached the Russian borders five times, contrary to all promises, and it was planned to create military bases in Ukraine, including on the shores of the Sea of Azov, and when the West showed its true face in relation to us by collapsing all agreements, trampling on all the principles on which it built and persuaded everyone else to build globalization. Given fair competition, the equal application of the principles of a market economy, the inviolability of property, and the presumption of innocence – all these pillars on which the West built globalization, proving that it was the optimal path for the development of all mankind, were destroyed by the West itself overnight.

Suspicions arose at the previous stages as well, but this made us finally understand that in this life we can only rely on ourselves and on those partners who have proven their ability to negotiate and who will never refuse agreements for the sake of their selfish interests.

Of course, we do not fall into autarky in this case. President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly emphasised this. We do not profess self-isolation, but in key sectors on which our defence capability and economic development depend, we can no longer rely on partners who can deceive us at any time. This has been announced many times. This decision has been made and will be strictly enforced. Everything that you are witnessing now in the work of the Government of the Russian Federation, in the decisions taken by President Vladimir Putin on our development, everything that you see at the stunning Russia exhibition, shows that we are steadily moving in this direction.

Of course, we do not fall into autarky in this case. President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly emphasised this. We do not profess self-isolation, but in key sectors on which our defence capability and economic development depend, we can no longer rely on partners who can deceive us at any time. This has been announced many times. This decision has been made and will be strictly enforced. Everything that you are witnessing now in the work of the Government of the Russian Federation, in the decisions taken by President Vladimir Putin on our development, everything that you see at the stunning Russia exhibition, shows that we are steadily moving in this direction.

We leave the door open for our partners. We have many of them who show their reliability and do not try to use economic and other relations for their own selfish interests.

We leave the door open for the West as well. But when and if he comes to his senses and there is a sobering up, we will see what they come to us with. Depending on what is proposed, we will decide whether to accept these proposals or not, whether they are in line with our interests and sovereign development, or whether they again create a "trap" for Russia's development prospects.

Question: Now Russia is protecting its compatriots, preserving history, culture and art. How does this strengthen the sovereignty of the Russian Federation?

Sergey Lavrov: This is not only about strengthening sovereignty, although this is an important part of the topic raised.

The sovereignty of a state like Russia, which has a centuries-old history and a huge contribution to the development of humanity, culture and art, is also manifested in foreign countries. This is the degree of our influence, our influence on the development of the world, the preservation of history, of which Russian culture and art are an integral part.

The overwhelming majority of our compatriots work in real front-line conditions. Attacks on their organizations in the United States, Canada, and Western European countries are unprecedented. They are deprived of their rights, forbidden to gather together and discuss how they, as citizens of foreign countries, but with Russian roots, want to organize cultural life and everyday life so as not to lose their traditions.

The attacks on Orthodoxy have reached unimaginable proportions. Not to mention the provocation initiated by the Patriarch of Constantinople with American assistance with the creation of the "Orthodox Church of Ukraine" and the destruction of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Look at what our once Bulgarian "brothers" are doing now. Although we consider the Bulgarian people to be fraternal. The fact that he now has such rulers is an anomaly that must be corrected historically.

On November 1-2 of this year, the World Thematic Conference of Compatriots Abroad was held, during which they reaffirmed their determination to preserve, protect and promote our culture, the achievements of literature, music and art. That is their moral strength. They openly and honestly confirm their right to have access to the heritage of their historical homeland. This is also a significant part of our sovereignty.

Question: What event predetermined Russia's emergence as a great state in the international arena?

Sergey Lavrov: On November 4, we celebrated National Unity Day. President of Russia Vladimir Putin said many words on this occasion, as well as during the celebration of other memorable dates, primarily the holy Victory Day.

The people's militia of K. Minin and D. Pozharsky in 1612 was a turning point for the creation of a state of global significance. Before that, there were principalities with internecine strife, periods of the Tatar-Mongol yoke. But it was as a single nation that our people was formed in 1612, when, regardless of social classes, it rose up to fight against the Polish invaders. It was a great victory, which laid the foundation for many others that strengthened our state and made it so influential and attractive for many countries and peoples.

Question: What difficulties did you face in your talks with representatives of European countries this year? Are there any changes from the past?

Sergey Lavrov: There were no difficulties because there were no talks. We don't aspire to them. The European states, the United States and Canada have severed all ties with us.

The only topic that is being discussed in one way or another is issues related to the functioning of our diplomatic missions. They are being subjected to enormous obstacles to their normal work, from bank transfers to ensuring the security of our territories in accordance with the obligations of these countries. If we are satisfied with difficulties, then we also create technical difficulties for the functioning of their embassies. Not because we are harmful, but because there is such a law in diplomacy – reciprocity. It's not our choice, but there's no other way to talk to them. They understand only such force, reciprocal, tough measures.

If we talk about substantive issues, the Americans periodically raise the topic of resuming talks on strategic stability. Recently, they handed us a paper in which they set out their (long-known) calls for the need to resume contacts on strategic stability. Like, we are responsible as nuclear powers. We have always been ready for such contacts. The result was the Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (START).

We were forced to suspend it in the sense that we would not comply with the procedures provided for in the Treaty, although we would maintain the quantitative limits established in it. How can we let the Americans into our nuclear facilities (they have been trying to do this for a long time) if they supply the Ukrainians with long-range weapons? It has already been used for attempted attacks against our strategic nuclear bomber bases. We have doubts that the Americans not only provided weapons to prepare these attacks, but also helped with information to try to hit the relevant targets.

The preamble to the New START Treaty says that we are no longer rivals, we have mutual trust, there must be a balance of interests and indivisibility of security. All this was trampled by the Americans, torn apart and thrown into the garbage. They say that "things have not gone well with Ukraine," but it is necessary to consider the continuation of the procedures provided for by these agreements. That won't happen. This is the only substantive topic on which we have been addressed recently.

The European Union has not made any such "approaches". We are well aware that Brussels has adopted a special circular prohibiting all EU diplomats in Russia from inviting Russian representatives or attending our receptions (although we have not invited them anywhere for a long time, because Russian diplomats are not given this honour either). It is even said that European diplomats in other states should inform the authorities of the host countries not to place Europeans next to Russians during official receptions. It's a disease. It's hard to say what it's called. But this is definitely not normal.

Diplomacy was created so that even in the most difficult periods, people could communicate and avoid situations where there would be mutual misunderstanding due to the fact that they did not talk enough to each other and asked few questions. It's their choice.

Now we pay the lion's share of our attention and work to the countries of the world majority, which are open to cooperation with us. We have significantly redistributed human resources within the Ministry and on the foreign "front" (embassies, consulates general). In a sense, it is easy for us to deal with the Europeans now. They don't bother us.

Question: What is the basis of trust in the outside world? How does Russia show its trust?

Sergey Lavrov: Trust in diplomacy and politics is built in the same way as in everyday life. If you have been promised and fulfilled, you have confidence. If something has been agreed upon, and the agreements have taken place, trust is strengthened. If you've been deceived once... For me, once is enough. But some people are more tolerant of various manifestations of human nature. They are ready to be deceived once, twice, and three. But at some stage, they also come to the realization that it is useless to continue working with these people.

To a certain extent, this is how our relations with the West developed after Mikhail Gorbachev and then Boris Yeltsin were promised not to expand NATO to the east, that we would be friends, build a space of security and economic cooperation from the Atlantic to the Pacific, where everyone would be equal. How many times have we been deceived.

I think our patience was very serious. But at some point, it "burst" as well. Once you've lied, who will believe you. We've been lied to more than once.

Question: 2023 has been declared the Year of the Teacher. Dmitry Peskov said that President of Russia Vladimir Putin is his mentor. Maria Zakharova said yesterday that you are her mentor. And you, as a diplomat, whom do you consider your mentor?

Sergey Lavrov: This is a natural process, when a young person comes to work, he always has mentors.

My first teacher was the head of the Department of International Economic Relations at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where I went before my business trip to Sri Lanka, A.E. Nesterenko. An outstanding Russian diplomat. In Sri Lanka he worked under the command of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary R.N. Nishanov. He also taught me a lot.

My main "maturation" in the professional sense took place when I worked as the Permanent Representative of Russia in New York. Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov taught me a lot. In particular, after he left the Ministry, from the government and took up scientific work. We communicated regularly. He gave a lot to my generation of diplomats.

I am glad that we were able to establish the Primakov Medal. It is a rare departmental award. I am particularly pleased, and I would like to thank the Moscow authorities and President of Russia Vladimir Putin for their support, for which an important event took place in 2019 – we unveiled a monument to Yevgeny Primakov in the park opposite our ministry.

When you work with the President of Russia, you get a lot from him. This should not be underestimated. Especially considering that I have been working with Vladimir Putin for a long time, and I continue to see how he reacts proactively and creatively to difficult situations, sometimes finding solutions that you yourself cannot always guess about.

Question: I have a question related to our generation. All of us were born and raised in a relatively open world, where we had cultural and technological ties with other countries, where there was international contact. Now in Russia there is a tendency to abandon Western culture. For example, in many Moscow schools, the celebration of Halloween was banned or considered undesirable. To what extent is it expedient to abolish Western culture in Russia, and what consequences can this have?

Sergey Lavrov: I would leave this question to the discretion of each society at school or university.

When I was studying at MGIMO, we organized our holidays, put on kapustniki, and had fun. Sometimes it was joking, sometimes they were fooling around somewhere. But we were all young.

I don't see anything destructive in certain traditions that come from the West. The main thing is that they should not be perceived as dominating our history, holidays, and traditional forms of holding memorable events.

I don't see anything terrible in Halloween, except that sometimes, according to Western films, bloody crimes are committed under the guise of Halloween traditions. I hope that we are not in danger of this.

Question: Do you think NATO has become weaker or stronger when there is Russia? What is the future of this organization?

Sergey Lavrov: In principle, NATO is already a relic of the past. The organization was not supposed to survive after the purpose of the alliance had disappeared. I am referring to the existence of the Soviet Union and, secondly, the existence of the Warsaw Pact. In order to counteract the influence of the USSR in Eastern Europe, the North Atlantic Alliance was created. Only then was the Warsaw Pact formed in response.

Prior to that (these documents are now known and can be consulted), Stalin proposed building European security together. At the time, it was ignored. It was also when the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union disappeared. There was every chance to take the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe as the basis for European security, which encompasses all the countries of our European region without exception, plus the United States and Canada. But they preferred to preserve NATO.

When we remind our Western colleagues that they signed very specific commitments, I am referring to the commitments of 1999 at the OSCE summit in Istanbul and 2010 at the Astana summit. The principles of indivisibility of security were reaffirmed there, including the obligations of all countries not to strengthen their security at the expense of the security of others. A particularly important principle – everyone agreed and wrote it down, the presidents and prime ministers put their signatures to it – is that no country, group of countries or organization will claim dominance in the Euro-Atlantic space. NATO members, despite all these "incantations" that they approved at the highest level, heard our questions about why they do not perform these functions. We suggested that if we fail to build equal relations on the basis of political statements, we should make these political statements legally binding. This was also the case in 2009, and we returned to this topic later. Our answer was very simple: legal security guarantees can only be provided in the North Atlantic Alliance. In this way, a policy was deliberately promoted to draw into the alliance countries that felt uncomfortable in the conditions of relations between Russia and the West, which gradually began to "tense."

What is NATO's future? Until recently, they proudly said that they were not an aggressive bloc, but a purely defensive alliance that used force solely to defend the territory of its member countries. Two years ago, at the summit in Madrid and this summer at the summit in Vilnius, all this changed overnight. It was proclaimed that NATO has global responsibility for security throughout the world, that security in the Euro-Atlantic area is inseparable from security in the "Indo-Pacific." Elements of the bloc's military infrastructure are being introduced into the Asia-Pacific region. Military bloc alliances are being created there to promote NATO components to this part of the world.

Back in the days of the Soviet Union, we said (we had the Krokodil magazine then, and now we have a Telegram channel where you can watch it. They claimed that they were not an aggressive bloc, but defending their territory. No one is talking about it now, they are spreading their (as we used to say at the time) "tentacles" all over the planet. Mournfully. But I think they will break down. You can't impose your hegemony on everyone so brazenly and persistently, the times are no longer the same.

Question: What do you think a modern Russian diplomat should be like?

Sergey Lavrov: Diplomacy is an ancient profession. Because everything else had to be negotiated. The art of negotiation is the art of diplomacy.

A diplomat must be well-rounded, erudite, and speak foreign languages. To have a deep knowledge of the history of their country, the history of its formation, the wars that accompanied the formation of this state and the formation of national patriotism.

I had several acquaintances who said: why would a diplomat do this? You need to know the history of France and the United States. No. This is not the case at all. You can't work in France, or the United States, or China, or India, or Africa, or Latin America, without knowing the history of your country. First of all, it always manifests itself in work. When you show your knowledge and strengthen your authority, it is immediately noticeable to your interlocutors. We can talk about this for a long time. The more literate and well-read, the better.

Another is the ability to win over. A huge number of fateful decisions became possible largely due to the fact that responsible people from different opposing sides who discussed this or that situation had good comradely relations. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, Ambassador Dobrynin's personal relations with Ronald Kennedy (brother of US President John F. Kennedy) helped to avoid undesirable consequences.

If you are a diplomat and political scientist or are studying to become one, do everything. Everything will come in handy.

Question: Could you give the right words of encouragement to those who are just starting their professional career?

Sergey Lavrov: In my previous answer, I tried to give parting words to those who want to choose the diplomatic path. But this is by no means the only profession that our Motherland needs.

The most important thing is the soul's aspiration of what you would like for yourself. I am convinced that there are no areas of effort that would be in vain or unpromising.

Ideally, the profession that a person has chosen becomes his life's work. There are times when, after getting an education, someone realizes that they would like to take a different path. There are all the possibilities for this.

The main thing is that you do what you love. It will contribute to the strengthening of our native country.

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