Briefing by Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, Moscow, April 17, 2025
Table of Contents
- Foreign Minister of Iran Abbas Araghchi’s working visit to Russia
- Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s participation in a Russia - Islamic World Strategic Vision Group meeting with ambassadors from the OIC member states
- Sergey Lavrov’s meeting with Deputy Prime Minister of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic Saleumxay Kommasith
- Sergey Lavrov’s official visit to the Republic of Uzbekistan
- Ukraine crisis update
- Approaches of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and his Office towards assessments of human rights across various nations
- Update on Moldova’s Autonomous Territorial Unit of Gagauzia
- Estonia’s provocative plans to intercept and sink civilian ships in the Baltic
- Estonia’s decision to revoke the right of Russian citizens to vote in municipal elections
- BRICS Centre for Industrial Competencies launched at UNIDO
- Finnish law banning property sales to non-resident Russian citizens
- 221st session of the UNESCO Executive Board considers the safety of journalists
- United Action and Remembrance Day on the genocide against the Soviet nation by the Nazis and their accomplices during the Great Patriotic War
- The 50th anniversary of the Khmer Rouge takeover in Cambodia
- The 80th anniversary of Russian-Guatemalan diplomatic relations
- The 47th Moscow International Film Festival
- The 180th birthday anniversary of Foreign Minister of the Russian Empire Mikhail Muravyov
- 1st Russia-Africa Young Diplomats’ Forum
- Possible resumption of Russia-EU energy cooperation
- Possible restoration of Russia-Georgia relations
- Kaja Kallas’s statements regarding May 9 visits to Moscow
- The office of OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media
- New allegations of Russia’s interference in Moldovan elections
- Western interference in elections in Serbia
- A new gas contract with Serbia
- Russia-China relations
- The Kiev regime’s inability to honour commitments
- The US’s tariff policy
- Cultural exchanges in the development of Chinese and Russian film industries
- Armenia-Azerbaijan settlement
- Dissolution of the OSCE Minsk Group
- Discussions at the OSCE Forum for Security Cooperation
- France’s activities in the South Caucasus
- Unacceptable statements by Friedrich Merz
- Situation in Ukraine
- Statements by Apostolic Nuncio in Ukraine
- The safety of Orthodox relics in the Middle East
Foreign Minister of Iran Abbas Araghchi’s working visit to Russia
On April 17-18, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Iran Abbas Araghchi will be in Moscow on a working visit to hold talks with his Russian counterpart.
The foreign ministers will continue a substantive exchange of views on international and regional priorities, including the state of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action on the nuclear programme of Iran, the situation in Syria, South Caucasus, and the Caspian Sea. The ministers will discuss practical aspects of improving coordination at the UN and other international platforms, including the SCO and BRICS.
In the run-up to the 18th meeting of the Permanent Russian-Iranian Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation in Moscow on April 23-25, the sides will place great emphasis on comprehensive consideration of mutual trade and implementation of joint transport and energy infrastructure projects.
On April 21, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will take part in a meeting that will bring together senior officials from the Russia - Islamic World Strategic Vision Group and ambassadors from member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) accredited in Moscow.
During the meeting, Chairman of the Russia - Islamic World Strategic Vision Group and Head of the Republic of Tatarstan Rustam Minnikhanov will inform the OIC member state ambassadors accredited in Moscow about the group’s performance in 2024 and its plans as part of a meeting in Kazan to be held on May 15-16 under the slogan “Russia and the Islamic world countries’ youth policy experiences: Common challenges and joint actions” on the sidelines of the international Russia - Islamic World: KazanForum 2025 which will be held on May 13-18.
Representatives from federal and regional authorities, Russian religious associations, and academic and business circles, as well as media members are invited to attend.
On April 21, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will meet with Deputy Prime Minister of the Lao People’s Democratic Republic Saleumxay Kommasith who will be in Russia on a working visit.
The participants will discuss the current state and prospects for comprehensive advancement of bilateral relations, and exchange views on ways to deepen political dialogue and to expand trade and economic cooperation, as well as contacts in culture and education.
Sergey Lavrov’s official visit to the Republic of Uzbekistan
On April 22-23, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will pay an official visit to the Republic of Uzbekistan.
During his stay in Samarkand, he will meet with President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev and hold substantive talks with Foreign Minister Bakhtiyor Saidov.
The participants will focus on advancing comprehensive strategic partnership and alliance by stepping up efforts to implement agreements reached during President Putin’s state visit to the Republic of Uzbekistan in May 2024.
Based on Moscow and Tashkent’s overlapping or aligned approaches, the sides will review international priorities of mutual interest, regional security matters, and interaction within the CIS and the SCO, as well as the Central Asia-Russia formats.
Since Uzbekistan has an observer status at the EAEU, the agenda includes matters and processes of Eurasian integration.
Preparations for the 80th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War will take center stage during the talks. Minister Lavrov will visit the Victory Park memorial complex in Tashkent.
Key events of Sergey Lavrov’s visit to the capital of Uzbekistan include a speech before the faculty and students of the University of World Economy and Diplomacy under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Uzbekistan.
The Russian Foreign Minister’s visit will give a significant boost to expanding Russia-Uzbekistan relations, advancing joint projects, and promoting the coordinating role of both foreign ministries.
We once again underscore the Kiev regime’s failure to adhere to the 30-day moratorium on strikes against the fuel and energy complex (FEC) facilities. This is evident from recent reports, and you are aware of such facts. The Kiev regime continues to brazenly disregard this 30-day moratorium on attacks against energy infrastructure, agreed upon by the Presidents of Russia and the United States on March 18, 2025, and endorsed by Vladimir Zelensky. The Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) have conducted nearly daily UAV raids targeting Russian fuel and energy infrastructure. Since the declared “energy truce,” over 80 such attacks have been recorded. Allow me to provide specific examples.
In the early hours of April 9, 2025, the AFU utilised eight drones to assault the Korenevskaya compressor station, an international energy facility located in the Korenevsky District of Russia’s Krasnodar Territory. This station supplies gas to the TurkStream export pipeline, with an annual capacity of 31.5 billion cubic metres. All UAVs were intercepted by air defence systems. Nevertheless, this constitutes a deliberate, premeditated assault by the Kiev regime against Russian energy infrastructure.
On April 9, two Ukrainian UAVs targeted the Temryuk gas distribution station, which provides gas to the city and port of Temryuk. Both drones were neutralised.
Between April 10 and 14, AFU UAV strikes and wire sabotage caused disruptions to high-voltage power lines in the Belgorod, Bryansk, Zaporozhye, Kursk, and Kherson Regions, the Krasnodar Territory, and the Lugansk People’s Republic. What were the objectives of these Kiev-regime drones? Their targets included transformer substations – integral components of the fuel and energy infrastructure – as well as the contact network near the Vasyurinskaya station of the North Caucasus Railway and the low-pressure steel gas distribution pipeline operated by Gazprom – Gas Distribution – Belgorod.
Let me reiterate: these are but a few examples. All relevant data has already been shared with international organisations and the American side. We will continue to do so.
The Ukrainian Nazis persist in their hourly – let alone daily – terror campaign against Russians. This reality must be acknowledged by those who inquire, speculate, or demand action to resolve the situation surrounding Ukraine. Perhaps the solution lies in ceasing support for the Kiev regime, which, in its terrorist frenzy, commits the following acts.
On April 9, two adolescents aged 11 and 14 were killed in Donetsk by the detonation of an unexploded ordnance. On April 10 and 14, explosive devices dropped from Ukrainian UAVs onto a civilian vehicle in Gorlovka and a residential area in Selidovo injured two civilians. On April 13, a woman was wounded by an explosive device in the village of Alexandrovka. That same day, a HIMARS MLRS rocket struck the Kiev District of Donetsk, damaging seven civilian sites, including a boarding school and two institutes.
On April 14, AFU drone attacks in the villages of Zabuzhevka, Giryi, and Zolotarevka in the Kursk Region claimed the lives of five civilians.
In the Belgorod Region, between April 12 and 14 alone, Ukrainian UAV strikes killed a lorry driver and injured at least five civilians.
On April 13, the AFU launched strikes using NATO-supplied Vampire MLRS systems against residential areas in Kamenka-Dneprovskaya and Tokmak in the Zaporozhye Region. Three private homes were destroyed, and the Tokmak city administration building was damaged. Fortunately, there were no fatalities. However, these strikes deliberately targeted civilian infrastructure – or, in plain terms, residential housing.
In the early hours of April 15, Ukrainian nationalists executed a cynical terrorist attack using kamikaze drones equipped with shrapnel munitions against civilians in Kursk and its suburbs. Strikes were precisely aimed at residential blocks and social infrastructure. According to local authorities, 24 apartment buildings sustained damage, three of them severely. Six of the nine injured were hospitalised, and an elderly woman perished. One strike was deliberately directed at an ambulance station – targeting those tasked with aiding the wounded, among others. Eleven specialised vehicles were damaged in the attack. Can anyone believe these drones struck ambulances by accident? This was a calculated, orchestrated terrorist attack on civilian medical infrastructure.
We have a question for international organisations, the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, his official spokesperson and numerous rapporteurs and special envoys, and UN agencies that oversee motherhood and childhood, protection of socially vulnerable groups of the population, including healthcare and safety of health workers. Where are your statements? Where are your concerns? Where are your press releases? Where are at least words of sympathy at briefings and news conferences? Where are the dedicated briefings or interviews on this matter? Nothing has been done. Ladies and gentlemen, you are not fulfilling your mandate properly.
All these atrocities are being investigated by the Russian law enforcement agencies. The Russian Investigative Committee continues to investigate the documented cases of brutal killings of civilians in the Kursk Region, committed by Ukrainian service personnel and foreign mercenaries.
In particular, the survivors from the Guyevo village said that the Banderites shot down six local Russian nationals who tried to evacuate, dropped ammunition on residential buildings, and were engaged in widespread looting.
Evidence was received that Ukrainian Nazis threatened to rape a mother of many children in Kazachya Loknya while her young children watched.
The death of nine people from Makhnovka village, Sudzha District, killed by Ukrainian nationalists in March, is being investigated. Gunshot wounds were discovered on six bodies. One of the victims was an elderly woman who was shot in the head.
This is just a small portion of the atrocities committed. Everyone involved in these war crimes will be identified and held to account.
For several days now the collective West has been raging about the high-precision strike the Russian Armed Forces carried out with a high-explosive missile at the building where commanders of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and Western instructors were gathering in Sumy on April 13. The Westerners began to push a hastily concocted propaganda fake about the Russian missile that allegedly killed women and children.
We have commented on this topic many times, but such things deserve to be told about a lot, so that everyone knows about the crimes the Kiev regime committed, because new facts come to light, which confirm that it was nothing more than a staged performance.
There is a lot of relevant information published in the Ukrainian internet segment, in particular, obituaries of the military personnel liquidated in Sumy on April 13. The local authorities have begrudgingly begun to admit the truth. For example, Konotop Mayor Artyom Seminikhin put the blame on the Head of the Sumy Regional Military Administration, Vladimir Artyukh, who organised a gathering of Ukrainian militants, inviting women and children to be used as a human shield. Even parliamentarians loyal to Vladimir Zelensky (such as Verkhovna Rada deputy Maryana Bezuglaya) have publicly called for an investigation into who was behind this and why women and children were used as a human shield at a military gathering involving service personnel of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and their curators. Why is this happening? Because the people of Ukraine, regardless of their political views, are beginning to realise that they have simply been used, and that the person who promised to bring them peace brought only massacre and hardship, and even began exterminating them. Now he is desperately trying to stay in power by sacrificing the people of his own country, instead of doing it by legal and democratic way.
Faced with mounting evidence, Zelensky was forced to remove Vladimir Artyukh from his position as the head of the Sumy Military Administration, effectively acknowledging the accusations against him. Thus, the junta leader is trying to put the blame for the latest terrible war crime against own citizens onto him.
Let me remind Mr Zelensky, who decided to shift responsibility onto the head of the Sumy Military Administration, about his own words. What was it that he said a couple of years ago? He said he was not an easy meat. If so, the responsibility is on him.
Does the UN Secretary-General António Guterres know about what is happening in Ukraine now with these resignations, with the obituaries for Ukrainian military personnel, with the use of civilian population as a human shield in a military gathering? On the day after the strike (the targets were absolutely legitimate) he was alarmed by Sunday’s Russian missile attack against Sumy and accused our country of attacking civilians. Now, after the facts have come to light, just as in the Bucha case, when during the past three years nobody, including the UN Secretary General, has been able to publish lists with the names of those allegedly killed, the story repeats itself. It has been revealed once again that it is all staged (I mean all the Kiev regime’s stories about Russia purposefully targeting civilian infrastructure, children and women). Will anyone in the UN Secretariat find enough courage and ability to speak out about this?
When the Ukrainian Armed Forces attacked civilians on the Crimean Bridge, when Ukrainian Security Service terrorists blew up Russian journalists in Moscow suburbs and St Petersburg, when drones attacked the Moscow Kremlin and Ukrainian punitive squads committed mass murders of civilians in the Kursk Region and buried old people alive in Russkoe Porechnoye, all those European peace keepers and international officials were silent and the UN Secretariat only diplomatically called for peace. And when it became evident that it was the Kiev regime, the local Ukrainian military administration that had come up with this human shield idea in order to cover up this “gathering”, everyone suddenly ran out of words. Yes, it’s true. The Kiev regime decided to cover its “monsters” with children. They did it on purpose. And now all their supervisors and sponsors are hushing up what they have done.
We have also noticed all those pathetic shouts and laments that the strike was delivered on Palm Sunday, a holy day for the Christians. Is it only now that the Western countries became concerned about the situation in Ukraine with the Orthodox believers, with the sacred places and things, with Christianity in general? Only now, on this Palm Sunday of 2025? And what about before that? Thousands of facts prove that modern Ukrainian neo-Nazis have nothing sacred for a long time now.
I will mention just the last aspect – relations between Ukrainian Banderites and the Church. Literally on a daily basis, at every briefing, every day, me, our ambassadors, representatives at international organisations and authorised officials, we really speak every day about how neo-Nazis abuse priests in Ukraine, how they desecrate churches, how they have literally legalised the abuse of shrines and holy relics.
So, what about the West, which recalled now the Palm Sunday celebrated by the Orthodox? Have you realised just now, at that very moment, that this is an insult to the feelings of believers? No, we’ll tell you what it’s called – it’s criminal silence. You have kept silence for many years.
The pertinent human rights bodies and mechanisms remain conspicuously silent: the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the UN Human Rights Council’s Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, and the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office’s Personal Representative on Combating Intolerance and Discrimination against Christians. This permissiveness towards the crimes of Kiev’s neo-Nazis – who seize Orthodox churches, persecute believers to the point of physical reprisals, and target clergy – is perceived by Vladimir Zelensky’s regime as encouragement and validation of its barbaric actions.
However, Russia refuses to remain silent. Our side is assembling evidence and publishing reports, including specialised reviews. I would like to remind you that two reports, Illegal Actions by the Kiev Regime Targeting the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), its Clergy and Parishioners, were already released in July 2023 and January 2025. These reports are available in English (2023, 2025) and have been disseminated to international organisations. Yet we have observed no substantive response from the collective West. Perhaps those now recalling Palm Sunday might set aside a few hours to examine these documents? They are entirely fact-based. All crimes perpetrated by Ukrainian Nazis will be investigated, and the perpetrators will face due punishment – as is already occurring.
Russian courts continue to render verdicts against Ukrainian neo-Nazis and mercenaries for their war crimes and other atrocities.
Oleg Zavaletsky, commander of a separate engineering-sapper platoon in the AFU Naval Infantry Battalion, has been sentenced in absentia to 24.5 years in a strict-regime penal colony. In March 2022, he and a comrade executed a civilian with automatic weapons on the premises of the Mariupol Metallurgical Plant.
A verdict in absentia has been issued against Ukrainian citizen Todor Panovsky. In January 2019, he attacked the Russian Consulate-General in Odessa by throwing a paint canister and five smoke grenades onto its grounds. The criminal received an 8-year prison term and is now subject to an international arrest warrant.
Mercenaries Nicolas Cha (Brazil) and Tero Olavi Koivisto (Finland), who fought alongside the AFU, have been sentenced in absentia to 7- and 14-years’ imprisonment respectively. Georgian mercenary Georgy Goglidze, captured by Russian forces in November 2023 on LPR territory, received a 9-year sentence in person.
Boris Nikolenko, a militant from the AFU’s 47th Separate Mechanised Brigade detained earlier by Russian servicemen, has been sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment. During the illegal incursion into Kursk Region, he terrorised local residents, obstructed their evacuation, and repeatedly opened fire on civilians and Russian military personnel.
On April 10, 2025, another gathering of the so-called “coalition of the willing” took place in Brussels. Predictably, no breakthroughs occurred. Evidently, their enthusiasm appears more rhetorical than substantive. Despite strenuous efforts, Paris and London remain unable to forge consensus on their delusional proposal to deploy a “multinational peacekeeping contingent” – comprising NATO member-state units – to Ukraine. Media reports suggest that aside from France and Britain, only the rabidly Russophobic Baltic regimes (note: not their populations, often kept ignorant by those in power) are prepared to join this reckless venture, which risks direct military confrontation between the Alliance and Russia. Most coalition members doubt the feasibility of such an intervention without US backing. Washington continues to avoid entanglement in these Allied escapades, likely recognising the real consequences they would entail.
On April 11, the Ukraine Defence Contact Group in the Ramstein format had its 27th meeting co-chaired by Germany and the UK at NATO’s headquarters in Brussels. The meeting was held for the first time without the head of the Pentagon attending. Vladimir Zelensky joined the meeting via video conference. No new innovative decisions have been made. They promised 21 billion euros for the AFU. The amount had been voiced earlier in NATO’s statements. London distinguished itself again by promising a new aid package of 350 million pounds to include “hundreds of thousands” of drones, radar systems, etc. Overall, the British are set to give Kiev 4.5 billion pounds worth of military assistance. Berlin is trying to be on a par with them. Germany has already shipped 30 additional missiles for the Patriot systems but it cannot send the US-made systems proper. Instead, Germany is ready to offer four more Iris-Т air-defence missile systems as well as to supply combat vehicles, tanks, ordnance and so on. The Federal Republic of Germany plans to allocate around 3 billion euros on that. Where do you think this money will come from? Of course, from their taxpayers’ pockets who are burdened with insane decisions made by both previous and incumbent authorities.
The German co-chairs declared the creation of a new “coalition of opportunities” under their authority, the ninth coalition overall. It’s like a joke: There is a coalition of the willing, and there is a coalition of opportunities. The latest coalition on electronic warfare is to include 11 countries. It is supposed to ensure reliable functioning of Ukrainian communications systems and drone defence, and suppressing Russian units’ communications.
The gathering generally reaffirmed the EU’s commitment to continue military assistance to the Kiev regime, yet the participants’ behavior obviously betrayed uncertainty if not perplexity. It is obviously a result of the US’s further distancing from this weird process. Europe has definitely forgotten how to act independently without regard to Washington since acting that way entails personal responsibility.
In Germany, an analitical report by a deputy military attaché from the German embassy in Kiev was made public. The report revealed “significant drawbacks” of the weaponry Berlin is sending to the Kiev regime. The key issues mentioned are operation complexity, frequent malfunctions, painstaking repair, high cost and lack of ammunitions, problems with spare parts and so forth. The conclusion is that at the current stage none of the German heavy equipment is “fully fit” for active use in intensive warfare. Such facts make it reasonable to doubt Berlin’s ability to be among the major and most reliable weapons suppliers for Ukraine. That said, this country is active in Ramstein meetings, inventing some kind of “coalition of opportunities” and knocking together some “defensive-offensive alliances.” These reservations increase if we recall that earlier German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius complained to the media about shortages of weaponry in Germany due to incessant supplies to Ukraine.
We have paid attention to The Times piece published on April 11, which states facts confirming the high degree of London’s involvement in the conflict in Ukraine. It claims, among other things, that as early as February 2022, dozens of British servicemen were sent to Kiev to instruct Ukrainian Armed Forces fighters on how to operate anti-tank systems supplied by London. It is also noted that in May 2023, after the transfer of long-range Storm Shadow missiles to Kiev, UK military specialists were smuggled to Ukraine to equip aircraft with such missiles and train Ukrainians in their use. Moreover, the collapsed Ukrainian counter-offensive in the summer of 2023 was named after the then Foggy Albion’s Secretary of State for Defence Ben Wallace, which clearly shows who is actually behind the development of military plans and the conduct of Kiev’s combat operations. This is yet another proof that this is not a Russian-Ukrainian conflict, but a hybrid war waged by the collective West, NATO countries, the Western minority against our country by Ukrainian hands.
Eleven years ago, on April 13, 2014, the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine adopted the resolution On Urgent Measures to Overcome the Terrorist Threat and Preserve the Territorial Integrity of Ukraine enacted on the next day by a decree of the Acting President of Ukraine Alexander Turchinov. What was it, in plain language? This is how the infamous “anti-terrorist operation” started, and in essence it was the beginning of the neo-Nazi regime’s civil war against their compatriots in Donbas, who did not accept the “victors’ government,” understanding that this neo-Nazi government, which had seized power in the country as a result of the bloody putsch in Kiev in February 2014 and unceremoniously began to exterminate not just dissent, but everything that – like their predecessors 80 years ago – they considered undeserving to be called “first class.”
The term “ATO” was used exclusively to pull yet another trick and to spin the Kiev regime as a victim. However, having announced the beginning of the anti-terrorist operation, Kiev had itself started pursuing a policy of state terrorism. In addition to relentless shelling and bombing of Donbass, a stifling economic, energy, financial, transport and water blockade was imposed on the region. In December 2014, the Ukrainian government stopped paying social benefits, including pensions, to Donbass residents and suspended the provision of bank services to individual and corporate clients. Regular food supplies were disrupted, and water supply to urban and rural areas was faltering.
During these years, Russia has never stopped drawing international attention to this state of affairs, and not only in the political sphere. Our country has been delivering humanitarian aid to Donbass on a daily basis which is as regular as it gets. Remember how these humanitarian convoys were looked at in the West? I remember well those massive white lorries carrying the essential supplies - clothing, food, medicines, and mobile energy units to heat homes - that saved the people of Donbass. The West went ballistic claiming it was an “invasion.” Later, they tried to backpedal, but it was too late. By that time, everyone knew that it was just another bogus claim by the Western media. They made up all sorts of fake claims such as these lorries allegedly carried tanks and weapons, or even military personnel. But it was humanitarian aid. There would be no need for it had Kiev not imposed the blockade which we discussed regularly and which I mentioned today. We used our daily humanitarian aid effort where we collected and delivered aid to the region to draw attention of the international community to what was happening in Donbass. We openly stated that the Kiev regime was deliberately exterminating ethnic Russians and the Russian-speaking people of the region.
We called things by what they were. We said accusing Donbass of terrorism was a crudely manufactured lie which the UN International Court of Justice confirmed on January 31, 2024. It ruled against recognising the DPR and the LPR as “terrorist organisations” as the Kiev regime insisted, and Russia as “sponsor of terrorism.” This court ruling refuted Kiev’s main argument to justify the war that it had unleashed against the civilians, and confirmed that all of Kiev’s actions against Donbass were based on horrendous lies from day one.
Every April 14, our people pay tribute to the victims of Ukrainian aggression. We are grateful to everyone who continue to oppose the Nazi fiends that came to our land, to defend Russians, and to do everything they can for these people to always have peaceful skies above their heads.
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The above facts once again confirm the urgent nature of the special military operation to denazify and demilitarise Ukraine and to eliminate threats emanating from its territory. As the Russian leadership has repeatedly stated, all its objectives will, without a doubt, be fulfilled.
We again draw attention to the conduct of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, which is incompatible with the status of a senior UN official and constitutes a departure from the principles of objectivity and impartiality enshrined in his mandate under UN General Assembly Resolution 41/148.
Double standards have become the hallmark of his Office’s operations, systematically overlooking blatant and persistent human rights violations in Western states and their allies. Conversely, UN officials exhibit undue haste in reacting to events – often unsubstantiated or later exposed as fabrications – in states deemed undesirable by the West.
A glaring example of this bias is the High Commissioner’s approach to assessing the situation in Ukraine, where the Kiev regime perpetrates widespread human rights violations.
For years, the High Commissioner has ignored the systemic discrimination against Russian-speaking populations. The de facto prohibition of the Russian language (a widely acknowledged reality) in all spheres of public life persists. Those daring to speak their native tongue face fines, administrative persecution, threats from nationalist groups, and even physical violence.
The ardent champion of civil rights, Volker Türk, remains conspicuously untroubled and unsurprised by the suppression of freedom of speech and association in Ukraine, where political and civic spaces have been purged of opposition parties, media, and civil society organisations.
Equally absent is any condemnation from the High Commissioner regarding the Kiev regime’s assault on religious freedoms under President Vladimir Zelensky’s campaign to eradicate the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church. This has entailed arson, vandalism, and forcible seizures of churches, alongside intimidation, threats, and violence against clergy and congregants.
The prolonged neglect by a senior UN official of the Kiev regime’s systematic and egregious violations of fundamental human rights, alongside the rampant spread of neo-Nazism and Russophobia in Ukraine, has emboldened the junta in Kiev to flout international humanitarian law with impunity. Militants from Ukrainian armed formations employ civilians as hostages and human shields, subject them to deliberate artillery strikes, and torture and murder Russian prisoners of war as well as non-combatants.
Recent atrocities committed by Ukrainian neo-Nazis against residents of Selidovo (Donetsk People’s Republic) and Russkoye Porechnoye (Kursk Region) have surfaced. Those who have borne witness to these horrors now lead altered lives. It is impossible to observe such scenes. I have consulted with representatives of Russia’s law enforcement agencies. Each time they provide evidence, they issue a warning. Indifference is simply not an option. Other territories under the control of the AFU further confirm that the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, under Volker Türk’s leadership, has broken down. Something has gone awry. It is now entirely defunct.
Evidently, we will not witness an adequate response from the High Commissioner regarding the deaths of Russian journalists. These are not isolated incidents but rather a pattern of mass killings of Russian media personnel in attacks perpetrated by Ukrainian armed forces, as seen in June 2024 and March 2025. They were even killed in bombings in peaceful cities.
The High Commissioner has also cynically overlooked the deliberate policies of discrimination on national, ethnic, racial, religious, and linguistic grounds pursued in the Baltic states. Under fabricated pretexts, ethnic Russians – who consider these nations their homeland – continue to face persecution and expulsion. Some were born there, others have lived their entire lives there, and many have worked for the benefit of these countries. There, they have built families and raised grandchildren.
The latest example of Volker Türk’s denial of reality is the legislative initiative to ban the Estonian Orthodox Church under the guise of a national security threat. This is what Orthodoxy represents in the eyes of Estonian authorities. With the tacit complicity of the OHCHR, among others, this absurd bill – which obliterates the rights of believers – was adopted a few days ago.
As it turns out, the High Commissioner’s lofty declarations upon assuming office – pledging commitment to objectivity, impartiality, and independence in discharging his mandate – have proven hollow.
The perpetuation of this situation will inevitably result in the complete erosion of the international community’s trust in the institution of the High Commissioner and the Office he leads. This, in turn, will critically undermine global cooperation in the realm of human rights. The High Commissioner and the OHCHR must focus on fostering dialogue and collaboration as well as delivering tangible assistance – not on stoking distrust and confrontation.
Update on Moldova’s Autonomous Territorial Unit of Gagauzia
The situation in and around Gagauzia, an autonomous territorial entity within the Republic of Moldova, has been a matter of grave concern, considering the proactive attempts by the Moldovan authorities to dismantle and curtail the region’s autonomous status.
You all know that the region’s head, Evghenia Guțul, was detained on March 25, 2025, under a far-fetched pretext and placed under house arrest.
On April 14, 2025, Moldova’s Constitutional Court invalidated Article 21 of a 1994 law on Gagauzia’s autonomous status. Under this article, the regional parliament had the right to take part in appointing the autonomy’s chief prosecutor. This authority has been transferred to Moldova’s Supreme Prosecutors’ Council and the country’s Prosecutor General. The court took this political decision in an arbitrary manner without notifying Gagauzian officials in Comrat in advance about the fact that this sensitive topic would be on the court’s agenda. Can you imagine that? But these things do happen.
Let me share another example of the way Chisinau has been treating the people of Gagauzia. On April 10, 2025, it started imposing outrageous and exorbitant fines on the people living in this autonomous region for using Russia’s Promsvyazbank to receive their social benefits. What makes this situation so hypocritical is that those who came up with this idea depend on Western foundations and their grants and many of these officials hold foreign passports.
Judging by what certain officials in Chisinau have been saying, it becomes clear that they want to scale back Gagauzian’s autonomous status and curtail its dissenting attitude to match other Moldovan regions so that Gagauzia’s autonomy is limited to cultural matters.
If the Moldovan leadership goes on to restrict voting rights for the people of Gagauzia who, for now, can call elections on their own, this will not come as a surprise. They seem to be moving in this direction. The same masterminds forced people of what they called an inferior race to wear special markings and badges 90 years ago. There was the Star of David yellow badge, and windows painted in red on ethnic grounds, followed by forcing people into ghettos and advising them to stay there. After that, ghettos paved the way for gas chambers. This is how Romanian nationals who are now in charge in Chisinau will treat the people of Gagauzia.
The Foreign Ministry firmly condemns the Moldovan authorities for subjecting Gagauzia to this totalitarian treatment. We urge the corresponding international structures not to turn a blind eye to the outrageous violations of human and minority rights and to force Chisinau to stop strangling the people of Gagauzia. After all, this is all happening at the very centre of Europe, a continent where human rights rank so high on the agenda of Western European public figures.
Estonia’s provocative plans to intercept and sink civilian ships in the Baltic
Starting from April 14, 2025, legal amendments came into effect in Estonia, enabling its Navy to use force against foreign ships. The Navy can now intercept, reroute or use other means for forcing civilian vessels to change course or sink them, if necessary. This mandate covers Estonia’s maritime zone, which includes its internal sea waters, the territorial sea and the country’s exclusive economic zone, which is not part of the coastal state as per the international law.
Russia firmly condemns these pirate-like aspirations because the mandate of the Estonian Navy transcends and violates international law, including the 1982 Convention on the Law of the Sea, which is a universal instrument. It is evident that Tallinn is acting in bad faith, seeking to undermine international law in both the letter and spirit.
If Russian ships are affected by any of these actions, our country will respond to the risks and threats posed by Estonia, a NATO member state, accordingly.
Russia stresses that the Baltic Sea is a shared water body for all its coastal states.
It is our hope that all countries which abide by the international law not just in word, but in deed, would be clear-eyed and objective in their assessment of Tallinn’s provocative decision, which creates major risks for Baltic Sea navigation and regional security.
Estonia’s decision to revoke the right of Russian citizens to vote in municipal elections
The other day, the Estonian parliament approved a bill amending the constitution to revoke the right of Russian citizens permanently residing in the country to vote at the municipal elections scheduled for this autumn. It does not matter that these people work at Estonian plants and factories, pay taxes, and therefore contribute to Estonia’s wellbeing. Although they faithfully comply with their civil obligations, they have been deprived of their civil rights only because they are Russians. This is plain racism that has developed into neo-Nazism.
That discriminatory initiative has been pushed by the local Russophobes not only to deprive a large part of the Russian-speaking citizens of Estonia of their legitimate, I repeat, legitimate rights, but also to have an opportunity to grossly manipulate the election results. The decision to exclude tens of thousands of Russian citizens from voting now and non-citizens in 2026 will work in favour of nationalist forces and substantially reduce support for the parties that traditionally uphold the interests of Russian speakers.
It is noteworthy that the initiators of that initiative disregarded the recommendation of the Estonian Chancellor of Justice to carefully analyse the consequences of that decision. They have brushed it aside in their Russophobic, nationalist and neo-Nazi frenzy. They have refused to hear the Chancellor’s argument that there is no connection between national security and issues in the competence of local governments. They have also disregarded the arguments of the authors of the Estonian constitution, the Estonian Bar Association, and the mayors of Tallinn and Narva, where the majority of Estonia’s Russian speakers live. They have no regard for all that because they have a contract and a plan for promoting Russophobia. They seem to be on course with its implementation.
The latest malicious decision of the Estonian authorities runs contrary to their international human rights obligations, including those they voluntarily adopted at the UN and the OSCE. We will insist that the relevant commissioners of international organisations condemn this openly racist scheme.
BRICS Centre for Industrial Competencies launched at UNIDO
The BRICS Centre for Industrial Competencies (BCIC) was officially unveiled on April 9 at the UN Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) in Vienna. The event was attended by Russian Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Alexey Gruzdev, UNIDO Director General Gerd Müller, and representatives of BRICS and CIS countries. The idea of the BCIC was suggested by Russia and supported by all members of the group, who reflected their desire in the BRICS Summit Kazan Declaration in 2024.
The centre will serve as a platform for inclusive selection and promotion of forward-looking technologies and best practices, as well as for providing advanced training to industrial personnel. It will also facilitate international technological cooperation, help look for partners, exchange practices, harmonise standards, and support small and medium-sized enterprises in accordance with the UNIDO goals.
We hope that the BRICS centre will enhance the coordination of the group’s nations on the industrial track and help attract additional investment for providing practical assistance to interested countries.
Finnish law banning property sales to non-resident Russian citizens
On April 11, the Finnish parliament unanimously adopted a law to ban the sale of property to the citizens “whose country of nationality has been found to be in violation of the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of another country and may be a threat to Finland’s national security” or who could be used by their country to the detriment of Finland’s security.
It’s like the question asked in a children’s film, “What’s his name?” Judging by the description, it could be Washington during the Biden administration. Or it could be its predecessors, like President George H. W. Bush and President George W. Bush, who violated the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of other countries. It could also be the Clinton administration, which violated the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of many European states. Serbia has a lot to say on this issue. So, I’d like to ask the Finnish parliament which country it has described.
Despite the obvious fact that this description fully fits Finland’s partners in NATO, which the Finnish citizens have been fooled into joining, it is Russia that they have in mind.
After this law comes into effect, the Finnish government plans to provide a list of countries that pose a threat to Finland. I urge them to start with NATO countries. Although Russia and Russian citizens have not been directly named in that law, the hysterical and Russophobic anti-Russia rhetoric clearly shows which country is meant.
I think it is evident that the authors of that document are not embarrassed by its discriminatory and even segregationist nature, which was even censured by Finnish human rights organisations at the discussion stage. However, none of their arguments have been taken into account. Neither far-fetched assumption that the citizens of foreign countries could pose a threat to Finland, nor the argument that the adoption of that law could reduce confidence in Finland’s legal system have stopped its Russophobic circles from adopting that crazy, weird and uncivilised law.
Finnish lawmakers seem to be ready to do anything to achieve an absurd goal of inflicting maximum damage on Russia and Russian citizens. And it appears that a certain part of the Finnish elite welcomes this approach.
Arguments against that law were primarily provided by the Finish citizens themselves, but who would listen to them?
We will take such moves by Finland and the Finnish authorities into account.
221st session of the UNESCO Executive Board considers the safety of journalists
The subject of protecting journalists’ safety was once again resonantly raised during the 221st session of the UNESCO Executive Board, which is closing in Paris, where many participants highlighted the UNESCO leadership’s recent action – or rather inaction – in this field. We have repeatedly indicated our resolve to compel UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay to fulfil her mandate in good faith before it ends. Our consistent policy, which we also promote at the Executive Board, is bearing fruit. Many countries have been noting the serious issues, substandard performance and the way the head of the Secretariat is deliberately avoiding fully implementing the instructions of the organisation’s policymaking bodies.
The heated debates on this issue at the Executive Board meeting clearly demonstrated that the disagreements over the UNESCO Secretariat’s policy on the track of (not) protecting the safety of journalists are becoming fundamental.
This trend became especially pronounced after Audrey Azoulay’s notorious report she delivered last year, which failed to mention Russian frontline reporters and other media workers who died at the hands of Kiev regime militants in 2022 and 2023 – apparently due to a paper shortage. Many are justifiably wondering why no fundamental changes have occurred over this time. Most of the complaints voiced by the speakers, primarily representatives from the Global Majority countries, about the UNESCO Secretariat’s work concerned the use of an opaque methodology for collecting data on the murders of journalists. This methodology prioritises information and opinions received from Western NGOs. You know that they are less than objective. Data should be primarily collected from UNESCO Member States. We do not deny that non-governmental organisations should and can be involved, but above all, official information should be collected, not biased storied paid for by such organisations as the US Agency for International Development, which disgraced itself by paying such NGOs, among other things.
It is indicative that only several Western countries spoke out to defend this methodology, which is not guided by the approaches and will of the member countries.
The Russian delegation reiterated that Director-General Audrey Azoulay’s selective approach to implementing decisions of the General Conference and the Executive Board, which prescribe “to condemn the murders of media workers without any distinction,” is unacceptable. The Russian representatives also pointed out that her report could not be used as a reliable and exhaustive source of information about the fallen media workers, and rejected the legitimacy of the methodology the UNESCO Secretariat used.
In particular, the difference in approaches within the Executive Board was really put into perspective when its draft decision on the safety of journalists was adopted not by consensus, as was done in previous years, but by voting. This was yet another eloquent piece of evidence of the deliberate politicisation, or better said, “Ukrainisation” of this universal organisation’s agenda by its Secretariat and personally by Director-General Audrey Azoulay, which undermines the collegial decision-making mechanisms, compromises the unity and prestige of this platform, and poisons the atmosphere of interstate dialogue on global issues of common importance that have not been privatised by any one state.
We hope that the future leadership of UNESCO, which will replace the disgraced Audrey Azoulay this autumn, will use fundamentally different approaches to fulfilling their mandates, based on the principles of impartiality, equidistance and good faith, as prescribed by the UNESCO Constitution.
There has hardly been a briefing during which we did not discuss the Great Patriotic War and World War II, be it heroes of the Red Army, or the key battles, or attempts by Russia-haters to distort the past or denigrate Soviet liberator soldiers. We often speak about acts of vandalism targeting monuments and burial sites in Europe.
Sometimes it even feels that Ukraine has already joined the EU, and this is basically true. In fact, it can be viewed as part of a peculiar European Union – the one with a clear Nazi tint and home to those who desecrate tombs, seek revenge, want to revise the history of World War II, those who are advocates and defenders of the Third Reich and glorify the bloody executioners who exterminated millions of civilians in Europe. This is the kind of the European Union the Kiev regime has joined.
Russia remembers the millions of victims it lost. In just a few days, on April 19, the United Action Day will take place across the country to commemorate the victims of the genocide unleashed by the Nazis and their accomplices during the Great Patriotic War against the Soviet people. Schools, higher education institutions, research and cultural institutions, regional and municipal agencies will all hold various remembrance events. More and more people have been taking part in these initiatives every year, proving that our people care about this issue.
The date has a meaning to it too. It was on April 19, 1943, that the Presidium of the USSR’s Supreme Soviet released its Executive Order No 39, Measures to Punish Nazi Evildoers Guilty of Killing and Torturing Soviet Civilians and Red Army Prisoners of War, and to Punish Spies and Soviet Citizens as well as Their Accomplices who Betrayed Their Motherland. This document marked the first acknowledgment of the targeted and large-scale effort by the Nazis and their accomplices to exterminate civilians in occupied territories and hold them accountable for these crimes.
We have been regularly mentioning the No Statute of Limitations project. Launched in 2021, it commemorates the victims of genocide. We have also covered our cooperation with the Presidential National Centre for Historical Memory that oversees this initiative.
As for the Foreign Ministry, we have been working with the competent agencies, including the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, in a consistent effort to designate the crimes perpetrated by Nazi invaders during the Great Patriotic War as an act of genocide against the people of the Soviet Union. This has been a demanding task for us considering the serious confrontation and differences we have on this matter with the West, but we must persevere and keep telling the truth. There are like-minded people out there who support us in our efforts.
During their meeting in Dushanbe on May 19, 2021, the CSTO foreign ministers adopted a statement at Russia’s initiative, The 75th Anniversary of the Verdict by the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg. It stresses that the facts established by the Nuremberg Trials that demonstrated the efforts by the Nazis and their accomplices to expel and exterminate civilians in the USSR must be treated as an act of genocide against the people of the Soviet Union. The same message found its way into the October 15, 2021 statement by CIS member states on the organisation’s 30th anniversary. Both statements were circulated as official UNGA documents. We view further efforts to communicate on the provisions contained in these statements regarding the act of genocide against the people of the USSR and offering more details on what happened as a major priority.
In 2023, the State Duma of the Russian Federal Assembly adopted a statement, On Genocide against the People of the Soviet Union by Germany and its Accomplices during the 1941-1945 Great Patriotic War.
On April 16, 2025, the Federation Council approved a federal law, On Perpetuating the Memory of Victims of Genocide against the Soviet People during the 1941-1945 Great Patriotic War. The Council also adopted an address to foreign parliaments and people around the world on preventing the unacceptable efforts to distort and falsify the history of World War II and to rehabilitate Nazism.
Having the international community recognise the crimes perpetrated by the Nazis on the Soviet territory during the Great Patriotic War as an act of genocide against the people of the USSR has principled importance for us. To achieve this aim, we have been working with our partners within the CIS on various international platforms. The CIS leaders adopted a message to the people of CIS and the international community on the 80th anniversary of Victory by the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War. “Facts demonstrating that Nazis and their accomplices expelled and exterminated civilians, as set forth in the verdict of the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, must be viewed as an act of genocide against the people of the Soviet Union,” it reads. This message found its way into a CSTO declaration as well.
We will be tireless and unwavering in our efforts to ensure that the international community learns about all facts discovered and unearthed by the members of Russia’s Investigative Committee and recognised by the Russian courts. What drives us in this effort is our commitment to defending the historical truth and perpetuating the memory of millions of innocent Soviet people who fell victim to Nazis and their human-hating ideology.
The 50th anniversary of the Khmer Rouge takeover in Cambodia
April 17, 1975, is a tragic date in Cambodia’s history. On that day, armed units controlled by an extreme left group known as the Khmer Rouge seized Phnom Penh, after which Pol Pot and his associates got down to building a Democratic Kampuchea.
Already in late April, 3.5 million residents were relocated by force to the countryside, where they had to take the most arduous jobs, clearing the jungle for new fields and restoring or building from scratch irrigation works.
Anything or anybody that failed to fit in with the new political system was mercilessly destroyed. Brutal reprisals were showered on the old authorities, the national bourgeoisie, the intelligentsia, priests and Buddhist monks. The local ethnic minorities – the Vietnamese and the Islamist Chams – were exposed to genocide.
Mass-scale executions, chronic hunger, and the total absence of medical assistance (doctors and hospitals were destroyed) led to a massive loss of human life: according to estimates, between 1.5 and 2 million people perished during the Khmer Rouge period.
After the Pol Pot regime collapsed in 1979, its supporters, who flocked to refugee camps in Thailand, came under close scrutiny from the West, specifically Washington and its allies. They got not only financial and material assistance but also diplomatic support. It is due to the West’s efforts that the Pol Pot faithful held the Cambodian seat at the UN until 1982, whereupon it devolved for years to the “Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea” that was dominated by the selfsame Khmer Rouge.
The 80th anniversary of Russian-Guatemalan diplomatic relations
April 19, 1945 is when the USSR and the Republic of Guatemala established diplomatic relations. On April 19 of this year, we will celebrate the 80th anniversary of this significant event.
Eighty years is a lot of time, but the first contacts between the two countries date back to an even earlier period. In 1880, Russian Emperor Alexander II and Guatemalan President Justo Rufino Barrios Auyón exchanged messages that set the stage for our bilateral ties. This was the step that made it possible to forge the strong bonds of friendship and mutual understanding and lay the foundation for productive, multifaceted cooperation.
We think that it is necessary to strengthen and augment the potential amassed over the past decades. We reaffirm our invariable intent to promote a constructive political dialogue with Guatemala, expand the legal infrastructure of bilateral relations, and diversify the trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian ties between our countries, based on pragmatism, mutual respect, and equality.
We congratulate our Guatemalan colleagues and friends on this significant date.
The 47th Moscow International Film Festival
From April 17 to 24 of this year, our capital will host the regular 47th Moscow International Film Festival. This year, it will be attended by representatives from 50 countries. In all, 1,600 bids were submitted. This is a global, historical brand. Figures in our possession show that there will be 17 percent more participants than last year. This goes to say that film-makers across the world are increasingly keen to attend this event.
The greatest number of films came from Russia, China, Spain, France, and Iran. The programme features a wide range of topics that are of concern to mankind. It is important that the festival will focus on the 80th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War as one of its main themes. This is reflected in various programmes. The Festival’s opening film, “His Name was not Listed,” directed by Sergei Korotayev and starring Vladimir Mashkov, Vladislav Miller, and Alyona Morilova, is also dedicated to it. This is a historical saga about courage, faith, and love for the Motherland, based on Boris Vasilyev’s novel of the same name.
The Moscow International Film Festival helps to establish cooperation between film-makers the world over, popularise the creative achievements of Russian and foreign schools of cinematography, and generally promote international cultural ties and strengthen mutual understanding between nations.
The 180th birthday anniversary of Foreign Minister of the Russian Empire Mikhail Muravyov
April 19 marks the 180th birthday anniversary of Foreign Minister of the Russian Empire Count Mikhail Muravyov.
The brilliant diplomatic career of Mikhail Muravyov began in May 1864, when he was appointed Junior Secretary to the Russian Mission in Berlin. In the next 30 years, he served with diplomatic missions in Stockholm, Stuttgart, The Hague and Paris. At the beginning of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878, the young diplomat served as a Red Cross representative on the theatre of operations; according to the Russian high command, he gave a splendid account of himself. In 1893-1897, he held the position of Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in Copenhagen.
On January 1, 1897, Emperor Nicholas II appointed Mikhail Muravyov Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs, and he became Minister of Foreign Affairs three months later.
Various events having great international significance took place between 1897 and 1900. Russia conducted an active foreign policy in the Far East and signed an agreement on the Balkan status quo with Austro-Hungary. In 1898, for the first time in the history of international relations, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs suggested convening a conference on arms reduction issues. Russia invigorated its foreign policy in the Middle and Near East; this made it possible to establish direct contacts with Afghanistan and to strengthen Russian positions in Iran and Turkey.
The Minister’s visit to France in 1897 helped strengthen ties with that country. In his detailed report to His Majesty the Czar (Nicholas II wrote on the document: “I have read it with great pleasure.”), the Minister noted that his talks in the French capital had proved successful and facilitated greater mutual understanding between both powers, as regards efforts to contain Germany and England on the European continent.
Mikhail Muravyov went down in history as one of the main initiators and architects of the Russo-Chinese Convention of 1898 on leasing Port Arthur and the port of Dalniy (Dalian) on the Kwantung (Liaoning) Peninsula to Russia. On April 28, 1899, he brokered an agreement with Great Britain on demarcating railway construction spheres in China. The document gave Russia the right to build railways in Manchuria and Outer Mongolia, as well as an offshoot from the Chinese Eastern Railway towards Beijing.
In the years that Mikhail Muravyov headed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Russia expanded its ties with multiple states. In 1897, an official Russian representative was sent to Abyssinia, and the Russian mission in Washington DC was elevated to an embassy. Moreover, new consulates were established in Iran and Morocco.
On July 21, 1900, Mikhail Muravyov passed away in St Petersburg. According to documents of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “the sudden demise of the Minister of Foreign Affairs evoked a universal feeling of profound and sincere regret … Despite his relatively short, three-year, tenure of the office of Minister of Foreign Affairs, it was marked … by outstanding events that had global significance.”
1st Russia-Africa Young Diplomats’ Forum
From April 22 to 26, 2025, MGIMO University will be hosting the 1st Russia-Africa Young Diplomats’ Forum, held as part of the 4th Russia-Africa: What’s Next? forum.
The event will bring together young diplomats from Russia and African nations to discuss international cooperation in its key aspects. The forum serves as another example of the Foreign Ministry’s so-called horizontal diplomacy concept. This initiative is aimed at offering young diplomats, government officials, and experts informal networking platforms.
The central theme of the forum, The Diplomacy of Victory, commemorates the 80th anniversary of the end of the Great Patriotic War. Its participants will include representatives from other countries’ foreign ministries and their diplomatic missions abroad, aged 25 to 40, who oversee matters related to international economic, political, cultural, and humanitarian cooperation, as well as those in charge of promoting relations with Russia in these areas. The event is expected to bring together over 60 diplomats from about 40 countries.
Delegates will enjoy an extensive programme that will include working sessions on key topics such as combating neocolonialism, enhancing Russia-Africa cultural and humanitarian cooperation, and sports diplomacy.
The forum’s final day will feature an official induction ceremony to accept new members into the International Association of Young Diplomats. This organisation was founded in 2017 at the initiative of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Council of Young Diplomats, aiming to foster collaboration among young professionals in foreign policy. Today, the Association comprises over 200 diplomats.
Question: It has been reported the other day that EU countries, in particular France and Germany, are considering partial resumption of gas supplies from Russia in the context of souring relations with the United States. The EU suspects that Washington might use LNG prices as a bargaining chip in trade talks. How would you assess the possibility of resuming Russia-EU energy cooperation?
Maria Zakharova: Yes, we have noticed the media mentioning this possibility when writing about the hypothetical resumption of Russian gas imports amid deteriorating EU-US relations. The EU’s policy in this respect should be assessed based on facts.
Let’s be realistic: Brussels has long become an unreliable partner in the energy sphere. I’d like to remind you that the EU launched a policy of infringing on Russia’s interests as a major energy supplier even before the coup in Ukraine. They began by adopting discriminatory laws (the Third Energy Package) and continued by approving sweeping illegal unilateral sanctions, which directly affected Russia’s fuel and energy sector.
There have been many relevant examples in the past few years, including politically-laden statements by various organisations headquartered in Western Europe, the “opinions” of various special rapporteurs and foreign ministers, anti-Russia get-togethers devoted to this topic, and endless accusations of Russia of politicising that issue and using it as a “weapon,” even though we continued to reliably export our energy to the EU. We’ve heard all sorts of things.
That frenzy was crowned with the Nord Stream pipelines, which have been blown up in the centre of Europe but nobody considered it necessary to investigate the crime. Several countries have withdrawn from these “investigations,” while Germany is mumbling something unintelligible but refuses to share information. When Russia proposed conducting an inquiry under supervision of the UN Secretary-General, these Western countries blocked the initiative. The latest example of their “policy of averted eyes” is complete disregard for Zelensky regime’s attacks on Russian energy infrastructure in violation of the 30-day moratorium. These are hard facts that must be taken into account, and they not only reflect certain sentiments but also the internal engine behind the operations of the Brussels bureaucracy.
It also appears that the EU is not planning to stop with these negative results. They are planning to increase pressure on the member states that continue to rely on Russian energy imports. They have punished themselves, and now they want to punish those who refused to take part in their crazy plan over the past few years.
The European Commission is drafting a roadmap for implementing the approved EU policy of blocking Russian fossil fuels. A great deal has been written on this issue. You can read everything about it. As far as we can see, the new roadmap will also concern the remaining volumes of pipeline gas and LNG deliveries from Russia. In other words, they plan to shoot themselves in the foot, and everywhere else, several times.
The EU is obviously not planning to increase Russian energy imports. Representative of the European Commission Anna-Kaisa Itkonen has recently stated at a briefing in Brussels that the EU was “ready to continue negotiations to increase imports” from the US and other partners to replace Russian LNG deliveries. This is a fact. Nobody has refuted or disavowed that statement. That is what we should proceed from.
Hence, it would not be reasonable to discuss a possible increase in Russian gas imports to the EU in the current situation.
One way or another, Russia has always been and remains a reliable energy exporter on the global market. We continue to supply gas to several European countries, and we might consider discussing different variants of energy cooperation with other countries exclusively on the basis of our national and economic interests.
As Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said, we will only discuss this issue if and when they come to their senses, revise their policy and change their behaviour. Until then, we will proceed from the existing reality.
There is no evidence that the current leaders of the EU and some member states plan to revise their policy of phasing out Russian energy imports, even though this is leading to economic stagnation in Europe and an even more dramatic fall in the standards of living in the EU countries. We don’t see the EU considering changing its stance or policy at this stage.
As for Germany, it is a striking example of how a state represented by its leadership has been acting contrary to the interests of the nation. An extremely difficult situation has been developing in the German economy, which had prospered and showed great potential for decades, since the Scholz government proactively announced a complete ban on Russian energy imports, turned a blind eye to the Nord Stream explosions, and illogically shut down nuclear power plants in the interests of green economy programmes. Another negative element is the current round of the trans-Atlantic trade wars. German businesses are moving to and registering in other countries. German professionals are horrified at what is happening in their country.
When German journalists came to Moscow a year ago to ask if Russia would be able to resume gas deliveries via the remaining Nord Stream pipeline, received a positive answer and were even told exactly when this could be done, the German government began to harass them and even threatened to close their media outlets.
When a German politician as much as mentioned the possibility of resuming Russian gas imports, with many reservations (if and when, in the future, and maybe), a harassment campaign was immediately launched in the spirit of extreme Russophobia. But the results of this policy are there for all to see.
Question: Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin has recently talked about Russia’s readiness to restore its diplomatic relations with Georgia. How have discussions with Georgia on this matter been advancing? Has there been any meaningful progress on this issue? What specific steps does Moscow expect Tbilisi to take?
Maria Zakharova: First, you need to read Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin’s interview. It offers a detailed insight into this topic.
For my part, I can repeat that our ministry and authorised representatives have said many times that it was Mikhail Saakashvili’s regime and not us who severed the Russia-Georgia diplomatic relations after this regime tried targeting the people of South Ossetia, as well as Russian peacekeepers with an act of aggression. In fact, this amounted to targeting Russian citizens. Today, the Saakashvili regime faces strong criticism in Georgia for what it did. As for Mikhail Saakashvili himself, he has been indicted on multiple counts by the country’s courts.
We heard reasonable and promising statements from the Georgian leadership in the fall of 2024 when an election campaign was underway in the country. They talked about offering their apology to the people of South Ossetia and their willingness to achieve reconciliation. As far as I can see, officials in Tbilisi have the same attitude towards Abkhazia. These are all positive signals, of course. We hope that they will pave the way for concrete steps to bring the relations between Georgia, on the one hand, and Abkhazia and South Ossetia, on the other hand, back to normal based on a sincere, comprehensive and fact-based vision of the present-day reality.
Russia stands ready to promote cooperation with Georgia in a comprehensive and mutually beneficial manner. There is a lot of potential in this regard. Russia remains a key market for many sectors of the Georgian economy, including wine and fruit. Russia is also a major energy and grain supplier for Georgia.
Russia and Georgia have a shared past. Culture, religion and humanitarian ties also matter. This is what we call people-to-people ties.
Russia is aware of the close historical bonds between our countries and their people and the special emotional context permeating our shared past. We also understand the need to promote comprehensive mutually beneficial cooperation between our countries for the benefit of our two nations. This is why Russia has taken several major steps to this end in recent years. In particular, we resumed direct flights between Russia and Georgia, while also offering Georgian nationals visa-free entry.
As for our diplomatic ties, we are dealing with the monstrous legacy of a man who has come to be known as a reckless adventurer in his own country. This goes beyond condemning him on moral grounds. In fact, there is a vast body of legal evidence supporting this case. International institutions shared this perspective when they investigated what happened in 2008.
Speaking of our diplomatic relations, we are ready to restore them. We are ready to go as far the Georgia is willing to go. The sky is the limit, as the saying goes.
Once again, I suggest that you take a closer look at Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin’s interview.
Question: EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas recently cautioned EU candidate states against travelling to Moscow for May 9, while Vladimir Zelensky has extended an invitation to European leaders to visit Kiev on that day. How might these statements affect commemorative events in Moscow? Which representatives from European countries are expected to attend Victory Day in Moscow?
Maria Zakharova: Their madness primarily affects themselves. They are prepared to become a laughing stock in the eyes of the world – denying history, rewriting it, resurrecting the darkest chapters of Western Europe’s past – solely to consolidate their current positions rooted in Russophobia, incessant anti-Russian phobias, and subservience to liberal anti-values.
The Global Majority already mocks at them. Nations that were recently their colonies, that not so long ago (by historical standards) attained their statehood, are laughing at those who refer to themselves as a “beautiful garden,” “civilised,” and so forth. The world knows the truth about World War II: the USSR’s role – and by extension, Russia’s, as its successor – in defeating Nazism and fascism, and the sacrifices of the Red Army. The Global Majority watches with disgust as descendants of the Nazis of that era, who glorify and extol the anti-feats (in fact, the crimes of their ancestors), now attempt to hastily distort historical facts, replacing them with historical falsehoods. This madness of the collective West is destructive primarily for the countries of the European Union and NATO.
We have our own vision for commemorating the 80th anniversary of the Great Victory. Today, I have outlined numerous political and international initiatives. We have allies who share our objectives and goals to preserve historical memory.
We will certainly continue to debunk fakes and lies, and do everything to provide as much information as possible. Archives are being declassified. Our ministry is publishing previously restricted documents that illuminate certain episodes that bring clarity to those events. Anthologies, textbooks, films – both artistic and documentary – are being produced or meticulously restored using wartime photos and footage. Literary works are being republished.
In our country, considerable attention is paid to public organisations: veterans’ associations linked with siege survivors and concentration camp prisoners. Although these are public organisations, the state provides substantial backing. It is involved in these efforts. This is the most important bulwark and support of historical memory.
Look at how our education systems – preschool, school, university – are finally beginning to open their doors, to enhance their curricula to grant history its rightful place alongside other disciplines (certainly important and necessary). Without knowledge of our past, progress in other fields may be possible, but then, unfortunately, one will have to repeat all the mistakes from previous historical periods.
If we speak of the influence of what they have devised and conceived, it only fortifies us in our positions. We perceive this as a signal that we must not, under any circumstances, relinquish these positions, that we must not, under any circumstances, trust them once again when they promise that should we merely weaken our attention to national interests, to our history, a rain of prosperity and well-being will pour down upon us. We have been through this before. As soon as this occurs, as soon as we move even an inch towards forgetting our own history, precisely the opposite transpires. Misfortunes and calamities descend upon us.
If there is any sense in this Western madness, in this frenzy over the Second World War (for us, the Great Patriotic War), it lies solely in strengthening us in our positions and serving as testimony and proof that we have chosen the correct path.
Question: Today you mentioned an intense discussion at UNESCO on the safety of journalists. How is this issue being addressed at other international organisations, for example, the OSCE? What does Moscow think about the first steps of the recently appointed OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Jan Braathu?
Maria Zakharova: International platforms have stepped up their efforts to discuss the protection of journalists. It is clear why.
May 3 is World Press Freedom Day, which is the subject of a number of conferences, meetings and symposia today. Indeed, the issue is being debated not only at UNESCO, but also in the OSCE – assuming the term can be used to describe what is happening in the OSCE.
The new Representative on Freedom of the Media, Jan Braathu, who made his debut with a regular report, had a chance to see the kind of “legacy” he inherited from his predecessor, Teresa Ribeiro, who had effectively ruined that essay. Her biased approach, her inability to resist using double standards and utter incompetence have made it a challenge for the new representative to restore public trust in this institution. It will take colossal efforts.
The truth is that the four years of her service have literally paralysed the OSCE’s work on this track.
It got to a point where the former OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media actually normalised deliberate disregard for bloody crimes and terrorist attacks against journalists. I am referring to the crimes committed by the neo-Nazi regime in Kiev against undesirable journalists, primarily Russian journalists.
The US Agency for International Development used the term “strategic silence” to describe this tactic in its relevant documents. Teresa Ribeiro, Braathu’s predecessor, not just picked it up. She introduced “strategic silence” as a methodology at her office (not her personal office, but OSCE office), as a truly artistic genre. They kept silent expressively – loudly silent at times and silent with feeling at others. Importantly though, they were silent.
Not even a hint of constructive dialogue or exchange of views was left in the OSCE’s humanitarian basket – dialogue means listening, analysing and trying to find common ground, not trying to slight your partners.
Previously, this humanitarian basket served to achieve a shared goal of creating appropriate conditions for media workers on various tracks, including the security track.
What is left of it now? Where are any tangible results? There are none. They have actually normalised what they have been long accusing Russia of doing, although our country never did it – of failing to protect journalists. I would say, this is the new normal when it comes to the situation in Ukraine. How could this have happened?
Moreover, the OSCE has even ceased to highlight the Western countries’ reluctance to abide by the commitments they have made or their domestic regulations on the protection of journalists, on the protection or guarantee of freedom of speech in practice. They continue to talk about it, but in practice, none of that is being applied.
In recent years, they have worked out, or brought out of mothballs new – or old and reincarnated – forms of censorship and pressure on dissenters. Now they have added repression and open terror to the methods they use. We have seen that so often.
Every time Western representatives showed this behaviour over the past four years under Teresa Ribeiro, the OSCE showed them leniency. In recent years, the Western minority at the OSCE have been using the media as well as the media workers as an instrument of political manipulation and pressure on the Global Majority states, a tool for pursuing their own selfish goals and objectives.
Jan Braathu needs to realise that over the past years, dialogue in this area has seen a landslide collapse, and worse still, trust in the institution has been grossly undermined. He will have to work with this.
It’s not that journalists have more problems today. That is obvious, too. On the one hand, there is artificial intelligence with its pros and cons, and on the other, the numerous armed conflicts and overwhelming numbers of murders and deaths of journalists in the line of duty. But the main challenge for the OSCE is not the number of problems journalists have, but its inability to implement its mandate. They have lost the right skills.
Teresa Ribeiro fell victim to her own incompetence. Let professionals deal with her now. She fell victim to the Western narrow-minded approach, where the OSCE literally swept any statements, agreements, documents and declarations the West had previously signed off the table only to enable the West to promote some momentary issue they wanted promoted.
Ribeiro failed to prevent this on her track, so journalists have simply lost trust in this institution.
I am not referring to Russian journalists only. If you ask media representatives from other countries, they do not see any added value (or any value at all) in these OSCE institutions either.
If [the new leadership] has a resolve [to change the situation] – from what they said – they need to start with restoring trust. This can only be done by performing their duties thoroughly and in good faith.
I could offer several criteria for the further work of the Office of the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media: absolute honesty, integrity, and impartiality in implementing their mandate without any political preferences, sympathies or antipathies. This is very similar to a doctor’s or a teacher’s code of conduct.
Question: On April 10, Head of EU Delegation in Chisinau Janis Mazeiks said he did not rule out Russia interfering in the Moldovan parliamentary elections this autumn. What can you say about this?
Maria Zakharova: It is some kind of a plague that touches them all. It appears that they will keep going with this rubbish until they all come down with it and emerge with a strong intellectual immunity.
If I were to provide an assessment, it is all about hypocrisy, lies, manipulation, double standards, promotion of falsehoods, and staging a show for domestic consumption in order to influence democratic electoral processes.
I will give you an example or two. On the one hand, Russia is being baselessly accused of influencing electoral and judicial processes in Moldova, committing cyberattacks, and spreading disinformation, but no evidence is ever provided. They could’ve come up with at least something.
Everything is as usual, and they either cite confidential information sources that cannot be disclosed, or, as the US liberal democrats used to tell us, “social networks have it all.” A couple of years later it turned out that they hate social media probably even more than they hate us, and they started moderating and censoring them.
On the other hand, Brussels is openly interfering in the internal affairs of the EU member states, candidate countries and associated EU members, which are openly required to revise election outcomes, among other things.
They went beyond forcing the authorities into taking certain political steps, and can simply cancel the election results if they are not to their liking.
Romania is a case in point. What it did stunned the World Majority countries and the United States and had them howling with laughter. They admitted they had never seen anything like that before and never could have even imagined that a thing like that was even possible.
Moldova had it in full measure during the elections. And, of course, there was that hideous “thing” called “referendum” (in Maia Sandu’s terms). It was marred by fraud, manipulations, and other unspeakable evil... How is that even possible? When we get accused, no one ever provides any evidence to corroborate the accusations, but when the West interferes in electoral processes to the point of moderating them, everyone is looking the other way.
Here’s another example. It is baselessly asserted that Russia allegedly allocates millions of dollars to bribe voters in Moldova. However, when the European Union spends millions of dollars to support pro-Western forces in the Republic directly, indirectly and via intermediaries, nobody thinks there’s anything unusual about it.
It is important to see and analyse the funding process, because not all of it comes in the monetary form. Much of it, under the guise of obscure “advancing development” goals, comes in the form of an insufferable burden of loans to be dealt with by future generations of Moldovan citizens.
In March, the EU Council approved a major package of financial support for Moldova in the amount of 1.9 billion euros, 1.5 billion of which were made available in the form of loans. Apparently, this is not seen as interference of the collective West in Moldova’s internal affairs, which is yet another case of double standards.
There’s more to it. It is widely claimed that Russia presents the main threat to Moldova’s security. They are dead serious when they say that the Republic of Moldova is next to be invaded if Ukraine falls.
There’s a saying, guilty is as guilty does. Apparently, this is what Maia Sandu is getting at. If that’s the case, she should say it as it is.
In fact, Brussels is working overtime to turn Moldova into EU and NATO’s anti-Russia outpost and a logistics base for shipping supplies to the Kiev regime. What does that mean? That means dragging Moldova by force, against the will of its citizens, into a conflict that is unfolding on neighbouring territories.
According to media reports, Moldova is second only to Kiev when it comes to receiving military aid through the European Peace Foundation. You do realise that the name “peace fund” is a sham, don’t you? It’s the European War Fund used to fund the war against our country.
That is another proof of the “freedom of speech” term duplicity. I think that Janis Mazeiks, who positions himself as a champion of independent press and civil society, should remember how he turned on the “strategic silence” mode and was not in the slightest outraged when the Moldovan authorities stopped broadcasting of not one, not five, and not even ten, but 18 TV channels and three radio stations and blocked over 60 Russian and Russian-language media sources. Did the EU representative have any qualms about it? Apparently, not, because “that’s something different.” There’s no such thing as double standards. As soon as we broach this subject, we instantly know there are no standards whatsoever. That brings us to the following conclusion: all of that is driven by biased attitudes.
Truth be told, Mr Mazeiks has, on several occasions, blurted out unknowingly the true reasons for the EU taking such good care of Chisinau. In September 2024, in the run-up to Moldovan presidential elections and referendum (or pseudo-referendum) on the country’s accession to the EU, he said that Western transnational corporations may be buying Moldovan agricultural land if the European project comes to pass. Remember how it literally blew up Moldova’s media landscape and what followed? What was done then? The local authorities were supposed to keep watch over their citizens’ interests. They pretended nothing was said. However, we understand perfectly well that he simply spilled the true goals of his association with regard to Moldova.
There’s one more detail which puts the finishing touch to this situation. According to the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service’s (SVR) December 2024 report, Janis Mazeiks demanded that the Moldovan side use “any pretext” to hold leaders of a number of opposition political formations, including the ones advocating a mutually beneficial dialogue with Russia, criminally liable, and to have head of Gagauzia Yevgeniya Gutsul step down. They had it up to here with her. They are not sure what to do with her. In March (we covered this today) she was detained at the Chisinau Airport and is now under house arrest. Here’s how the EU “democracy” played out in Moldova.
The people of Moldova should be mindful of that. Everyone should be aware by now that this represents Brussels’ signature behaviour. It tends to go through its favourites at a fast clip and to forget the promises it handed out freely when the time was right. Unfortunately, they continue to stick to this tactic and are widely using it. We hope they will stop destroying Moldova, its statehood, and culture, but we shouldn’t forget about the realities, either.
Question: What does Moscow expect from the new Serbian government now that, following criticism from the European Union, Aleksandar Vulin had to step down?
Maria Zakharova: First, I think this is an excellent opportunity for the EU, including the people we just talked about and their colleagues, to make a strong protest to their own selves in connection with interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign state, this time Serbia.
Second, I will say something that you already know. We will be building mutually beneficial cooperation with that country in the spirit of traditionally friendly and partner-like relations in the best interests of our peoples. Why is Brussels interfering in the domestic politics and internal affairs, all the way down to members of the Cabinet of Ministers, the Serbian Government? That question is not for Moscow to answer.
Question: How is the negotiating process going? What does the signing of a new Serbia-Russia gas agreement depend on, since the current one expires on May 31?
Maria Zakharova: Contacts under the new contract for Russian natural gas supplies to Serbia are maintained by the respective competent agencies of the two countries.
I can check it with them if you provide me with more specific questions. That way, it will be easier for us to redirect your questions to the experts. We will then let you have their answers.
Question: A recent central meeting in Beijing addressed China’s engagement with neighbouring countries. It highlighted China’s readiness to collaborate across various spheres – strengthening strategic mutual trust, building a high-level connectivity network, jointly ensuring regional stability, expanding exchanges, and facilitating cross-border mobility – to forge a community of shared destiny with these nations. How would you comment on this? As the world’s largest neighbouring countries, how should Russia and China cooperate to uphold peace and development regionally and globally?
Maria Zakharova: Russia and China are the world’s largest neighbouring states, whose relations exemplify a model of equal, constructive, and respectful cooperation between major powers in the modern era – powers that conscientiously uphold their roles in international affairs.
The senior leadership of our nations demonstrated political wisdom by definitively resolving what was once a highly sensitive border issue, transforming it (as your and our experts note) into a “belt of eternal peace and friendship” to be passed down through generations. A beautiful phrase, but one I believe encapsulates genuine wisdom.
The Russian Far East and Northeast China are bound by extensive practical cooperation and cultural exchanges, facilitated by a dedicated intergovernmental commission established for this purpose. A range of measures to further expand ties, including reciprocal travel for citizens, are being implemented. Our experts are addressing visa-related matters – a topic I frequently discuss. I am confident that Russia and China set an exemplary standard for good-neighbourliness in cross-border interaction. This does not mean there are no issues to resolve; rather, it underscores our readiness to address them on a mutually respectful basis.
The Russian Federation maintains close partnerships with all states bordering China, including those discussed at the aforementioned meeting.
Coordinated efforts are underway bilaterally and through multilateral frameworks such as the SCO, ASEAN dialogue platforms, trilateral formats, and others. Moscow and Beijing share an interest in ensuring the security and stability of all regional neighbours – a key objective of the SCO, whose founding was spearheaded by Russia and China. Our countries stand ready to support the steady social and economic development of regional states while firmly rejecting destructive interference by extra-regional forces, particularly those pursuing anti-Russian and anti-Chinese agendas.
We have developed a joint approach to regional matters across multiple dimensions – political, economic, and in countering emerging challenges and threats. Concrete actions are being formulated in several areas.
Another critical aspect of our collaboration lies in how Moscow-Beijing cooperation strengthens the Global South and East, where nations have grown weary of the West’s perpetual dominance reminiscent of quasi-colonial idée fixe. These countries seek to build (I reiterate) mutually respectful relations and engage as equals. In this regard, I believe the role of our nations is indispensable.
Our nations advance a more equitable multipolar world order – an alternative to the endless diktats of a narrow minority of states or individual countries that persist in considering themselves exceptional and entitled to impose their will upon others.
Question: In a recent interview with Kommersant, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated that the key components of a settlement to the conflict around Ukraine are difficult to coordinate and remain under discussion. What lies at the heart of these disagreements? To what extent are the principles for resolution outlined by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin on June 14, 2024, acceptable to the United States? What proposals has the American side put forward?
Maria Zakharova: Your question resembles a “patchwork quilt.” You began by asking about the essence of disagreements and why negotiating settlement parameters proves challenging. Have you not heard or seen what we articulate daily? Even without addressing the root causes – the paramount issue – whose elimination is imperative, the Kiev regime has demonstrated a lack of capacity for compromise even in respect of the current agreement on a 30-day moratorium on energy infrastructure strikes. I would not reduce everything to this, but the issue is vast.
In his Kommersant interview, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov elaborated precisely on this matter. Even this single component illustrates that, despite the historical complexities and the West’s reckless endeavours – literally forging a nascent democracy on Ukrainian soil – without addressing this key element, or by using it as a case study, the inherent difficulty and uneasiness of formulating agreement parameters become evident. You speak of “agreement parameters,” yet the Kiev regime displays a clear incapacity for agreement. This is undeniable. Should you isolate a particular episode, you will discern the magnitude of the problem.
Let me recall: immediately after Washington and Moscow proposed a moratorium on strikes against energy infrastructure, Vladimir Zelensky endorsed the idea – not as an external proposal but as an opportunity for his and Ukraine’s participation. He aligned himself with it, becoming part of the moratorium. Was there a single day when they adhered to what they ostensibly pledged? This was not a formal “signature,” but a declaration by someone who constantly insists that he governs all Ukraine. Thirty days of restraint – publicly assured to the international community – proved unattainable. Thirty days of simply refraining from what they promised to avoid.
This stands as a paramount illustration of the necessity for any parameters established within the framework of potential future agreements to be scrupulously adhered to and enforced by all parties involved. In this context, the Kiev regime is once again exhibiting an unequivocal lack of capacity for agreement. This is not unprecedented; they have demonstrated such behaviour previously. Historically, as has been articulated and proclaimed, they misled the international community with declarations of their desire or intention to honour the Minsk Agreements. Now, they claim participation in the declared moratorium while openly violating it. What is the subject of our discourse, then?
Addressing the second segment of your question: it appears to me that Washington possesses its official representatives, commentators, and experts who are capable of articulating the official stance and supplementing it with their own insights. It is advisable to direct such inquiries to them.
Permit me, however, to provide a succinct response. At this juncture, we (encompassing the entire global community) are interfacing with a new US administration. This administration diverges markedly from its predecessor in every respect. Unlike its antecedents, it does not depend on the imposed judgements of the globalists or the expertise of those they engage. This administration, as evidenced by its statements, endeavours to thoroughly comprehend the underlying issues. For what purpose? To formulate its own perspective on the situation and potential resolutions.
These declarations have been articulated by the head of state, Donald Trump, representatives of his administration, and directly by those whom he has appointed as representatives authorised for international engagements in the context of the Ukrainian crisis. We would prefer to discuss a settlement, yet currently, we are addressing a crisis.
All of this necessitates patience, time, and a meticulous, measured approach founded upon the examination of facts. We observe how the current administration is manifesting its resolve to accomplish its objectives.
Naturally, we are merely at the commencement of this journey. To date, only preliminary steps have been undertaken. We communicate our successes, and candidly, we furnish the public and media with ample detail. We also do not conceal the existence of persistent, complex issues that remain unaddressed.
I refer you once more to the interview by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov with Kommersant and to his other speeches and statements on this subject.
We persist in maintaining confidential dialogues with the American side. We discern that they acknowledge our concerns on a broad array of significant matters. We are convinced that, based on the information we provide, they have developed a greater comprehension of certain facets and of our argumentation concerning the imperative of eradicating the root causes of the Ukrainian crisis. This pertains to the matters you inquired about, as expounded by Russian President Vladimir Putin when he addressed my colleagues in this very room on June 14, 2024. Primarily, we are discussing efforts to eradicate all that is Russian, to annihilate the Russian-speaking populace, and the plans to integrate Ukraine into NATO.
Question: On April 2, Donald Trump announced the introduction of high trade tariffs against 211 countries and territories. On April 9, he declared that the US had put the tariffs on a 90-day pause for more than 75 states. Nevertheless, a basic 10-percent rate is left for all countries. On April 12, the US relieved smart-phones, computers, external hard drives, and a number of other electronic appliances of “reciprocal tariffs.” Somewhat later, US Secretary of Trade Howard Lutnick explained that this decision was just a reprieve. According to Secretary Lutnick, goods in this category would come under tariffs on semiconductors likely to become effective within one or two months. What are, in your opinion, the deep-down causes of these vacillations in the US tariff policy that is constantly subject to adjustment?
Maria Zakharova: I can say it in two words: They are pressing for preferences. They are not concealing this, either. But each time – we said this at the previous briefing – they do so in their own way. Every new administration or some “teams” that replace each other… In this case, they do it in this manner.
Washington is not concealing that it no longer regards itself as bound by international trade obligations, commercial law, or WTO commitments. The United States has opted for unilateral tariff protectionism. Obviously, they hope that this expedient will help US companies to gain better access to external markets. They expect that it will also attract investment and compel major industrial companies to relocate to the United States. All of this follows from their own official statements and explanations.
In fact, the White House is using the tariff barrier to make trade partners accept the US terms. And again, we are back to these two words: pressing for preferences.
Any shocks to the global economy that threaten to slow down its growth rates and cause a general decline in consumption will not influence the world processes in the best possible way at this stage.
As a major exporter and responsible participant in the multilateral trade system, Russia is interested in honest and open trade relations and in honest and equal competition. What is the meaning of “equal?” This does not mean that everyone has equal capabilities. It is clear that they are different in each particular case. But everyone should abide by the same rules insofar as they are parties to a common space, where it is necessary to interact in a civilised manner. Moreover, the rules of behavior in this space have been elaborated long ago and no one has renounced them officially.
Our country is against using any unilateral trade restrictions, such as illegitimate sanctions, politicised climatic requirements passed off as environmental concerns, or other methods of unfair competition that affect global trade and are at odds with voluntary commitments assumed within the framework of relevant organisations.
It is wrong for a country to say that it is leaving an international organisation in keeping with the existing procedures and commitments it has assumed. In such a case, it should withdraw from this organisation. But it is odd if it keeps its preferences within the organisation and yet claims that being a member does not imply any responsibility or obligations and that as a country it is not bound by any terms. What I mean is that either they are a full member, which implies the existence of opportunities, commitments, rights and responsibilities, or they are not a member. If so, this calls for an official statement that they are withdrawing from the WTO in this case.
Question: The 15th Beijing International Film Festival will be held on April 18-26. Russian director Felix Umarov’s film The Poet was shortlisted for the festival’s competition programme. Meanwhile, the 47th Moscow International Film Festival will start on April 17, featuring 27 Chinese films. What do you think were the key factors that contributed to its outstanding achievements? How do you assess the role of cultural exchange within film festivals for the development of the Chinese and Russian film industries?
Maria Zakharova: Russian-Chinese cinema cooperation is an important element in the multifaceted complex of bilateral relations. This is not a recent issue, but a tradition. Our cinema has always been well known and loved in China. Now, as before, our audience is interested in watching Chinese films. Now we are talking about bilateral exchanges and joint projects.
This area of cooperation is in the focus of our leaders’ attention. Last year, the heads of state addressed the issue of joint film production on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit in Kazan. In order to implement the agreements reached, the respective Russian and Chinese departments are currently making consistent efforts to further expand and enrich relevant exchanges with new content.
In March, a representative delegation of Russian filmmakers led by Russian Minister of Culture Olga Lyubimova visited China. A roundtable discussion was heldwith the two countries’ experts, and new creative projects were presented. Russian representatives were able to visit large local film studios. As part of the talks, the parties agreed on an action plan for joint film production, which we expect to be signed in the near future.
I believe that we have many opportunities for deepening our cooperation in this sphere. The history of the two countries is full of glorious moments that can be released in cinemas. I am confident that we are in for many new film discoveries.
In this context, I would like to especially praise the successful premiere of the joint Russian-Chinese film Red Silk last February.
Annual festivals of national films, which the two countries’ people always enjoy with genuine interest, is another example. Our films always appear at leading international film festivals held in Russia and China, including those you mentioned.
We are delighted that The Poet was such a success. We wish its director Felix Umarov and the entire film crew best of luck at the upcoming 15th Beijing International Film Festival. We look forward to watching Chinese films in Moscow. April is traditionally full of cinematic events. We wish everyone a pleasant viewing. We will follow the new releases.
Question: This week, Foreign Minister of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan said that Yerevan, Baku and Ankara have never been as close to peace as they are today. He also put forward several proposals to unblock transport routes in the region. In turn, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reiterated his call for implementing the entire package of agreements between Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia signed in 2020-2022, including the one to unblock transport. How could Moscow facilitate the implementation of these agreements today?
Maria Zakharova: The set of agreements at the highest level that you are referring to remains fully relevant (1, 2, 3, 4), and the early resumption of full-fledged cooperation in a trilateral format would facilitate the achievement of sustainable peace and prosperity in the South Caucasus.
We are ready to assist our Azerbaijani and Armenian partners on all key tracks of reconciliation between the two countries. We have achieved a great deal when it comes to unblocking transport and economic ties as part of the Trilateral Working Group co-chaired by the deputy prime ministers of Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia.
We are ready to share our experience in border delimitation and demarcation – our specialists are among the best in post-Soviet countries. We also have unique cartographic material at our disposal.
We can also help resolve the humanitarian issues that have accumulated over the years of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. In short, we will only be happy to help our Azerbaijani and Armenian friends advance the process of normalising relations.
Question: In his speech in parliament on Tuesday, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan called for dismantling the OSCE Minsk Group, in accordance with Azerbaijan’s demand. How does Moscow view the Armenian leader’s readiness [to make a deal with Azerbaijan]? What else do you think should be done right now to finally sign a peace treaty?
Maria Zakharova: We have repeatedly commented on the issue of the OSCE Minsk Group, including at previous briefings.
Our position is well known. The OSCE-approved mandate of the Minsk Conference co-chairs lost its relevance with the termination of contacts between the American and French co-chairs and the Russian co-chair of the Minsk Group in February 2022, along with Armenia’s decision to recognise Nagorno-Karabakh as an integral part of the Republic of Azerbaijan following the Armenia-Azerbaijan-EU-France summit in Prague on October 6, 2022, as well as with a radical change in the situation on the ground in September 2023.
As a result, all bodies of the Minsk Conference, including the Minsk Group, the High-Level Planning Group and the office of Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office on Nagorno-Karabakh are subject to dissolution. We believe that the best way to proceed with this is for Baku and Yerevan to put forth a joint proposal to dismantle these institutions.
For our part, we intend to continue to assist our partners in overcoming the remaining obstacles to signing a peace treaty, as well as in unblocking transport and economic ties, the delimitation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and addressing humanitarian issues, guided by the trilateral agreements signed at the highest level in 2020-2022.
We reaffirm our readiness to provide a Russian platform for talks between representatives of Azerbaijan and Armenia on the entire range of bilateral issues, including the conclusion of a peace treaty.
Question: Yulia Zhdanova, Acting Head of the Russian Federation’s delegation at the Vienna negotiations on military security and arms control, affirmed that the Western coalition, which is providing comprehensive support to the Kiev Nazis, comprises approximately 50 states. “It is extremely challenging to foster constructive discussions at the OSCE Forum on Security Cooperation with this group,” Yulia Zhdanova remarked.
“But is it even necessary to do so?” What do you see as the usefulness of this Forum? And how do you assess the current state of the “process initiated in Helsinki” during the USSR era, largely influenced by the outcomes of the Second World War?
Maria Zakharova: Following the suspension of the Russia-NATO Council’s activities at the initiative of Western representatives, the OSCE Forum on Security Cooperation (FSC) remains virtually the only multilateral military and political channel between our country and the collective West.
It is of fundamental importance that the work within the FSC is conducted with the equal participation of all member states without exception and is based on the OSCE’s core principle of consensus. This ensures that no one can impose an unacceptable decision on Russia (or any other state) or disregard our opinion. In 2024, the Danish chairmanship of the Forum, driven by Russophobia, attempted to violate this principle, but this attempt was decisively thwarted by the Russian Federation.
At the same time, we are compelled to acknowledge that the remilitarisation of politics and public consciousness in Europe is having a detrimental impact on the Forum. Western member states are investing significant efforts to obstruct the implementation of its mandate, which is centred on the task of strengthening security and stability through negotiations on specific confidence-building measures. In practice, however, we are witnessing diametrically opposed processes in Europe (remilitarisation, erosion of trust, collapse of the remaining mechanisms guaranteeing security), which are leading to a precipice.
Moreover, the French, Canadians, Poles, Baltic states, and other radicals are seeking to use the FSC as a platform for hybrid confrontation with Russia. We are being inundated with disinformation, including concerning the special military operation. We disavow such approaches and utilise this platform to disseminate information based on facts and verified data.
Over the past three years, at the OSCE Forum, we have presented approximately a hundred reports on the real situation in the zone of the special military operation and on the war crimes of the Kiev regime, facilitated by its Western patrons, including in the Kursk Region. We are forcing our opponents to open their eyes and see the truth, however unpleasant it may be for them. This is particularly important today, as independent media and alternative sources of information in Europe have been effectively silenced, leaving only the EU-NATO official narrative.
We have repeatedly spoken about the profound crisis currently facing the OSCE as a whole. I would like to recall Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks at the OSCE Ministerial Council in December 2024. The current state of the Organisation is a result of the obsessive desire of Western countries to subordinate the Vienna platform to their own interests and to use it as a tool of pressure. We have seen it all in their pursuit of this obsessive idea.
The most alarming aspect is the departure from the OSCE’s principles, the disrespect for the fundamental mechanisms that underpin this organisation, and the processes within the OSCE platform that it was created to counteract. For example, we are witnessing the rise of neo-Nazi sentiments and the glorification of Nazism. In the West, there are concerted attempts to revise the outcomes of the Second World War, to negate the decisive contribution of the Soviet people to the Victory, and to whitewash Nazi criminals. The OSCE not only fails to counteract this but, through its inaction, it aids those who engage in this obscurantism. The tragic lessons of history are being deliberately forgotten in the West. As long as NATO and EU countries refuse to abandon their geopolitical games, the Organisation, whose foundations were laid by the Helsinki process and, in essence, by the Victory over Nazism in 1945, will have no future. It is crucial not only to preserve it in form but, most importantly, to ensure that its content begins to heal.
Question: French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot said this week he hoped to see EU mission in Armenia expand. According to him, the mission “monitors and allays tensions” in the South Caucasus. What is the Foreign Ministry’s assessment of France’s activity in the South Caucasus in general and the support Paris accords to the EU mission in Armenia?
Maria Zakharova: We commented on this issue many times. There is every reason to believe that the Europeans, primarily the French, are interested in maintaining regional tensions in order to achieve their own geopolitical goals.
We have no illusions whatsoever about (no matter how hard they may try to assure us otherwise) what stands behind Paris’ “good intentions” in the South Caucasus. Their actual agenda in the region has nothing to do with de-escalation, normalisation, peace-building, or peacemaking. None of that. We have repeatedly witnessed the Elysee Palace’s attempts to foist its mediation services onto them at the cost of aggravating Armenia-Azerbaijan differences. The French bear much responsibility for sabotaging the work and the actual collapse of the OSCE Minsk Group in 2022.
What are the EU mission’s true goals in Armenia? We are well aware of them. They are in no way seeking to promote normalised relations between Baku and Yerevan. The EU representatives are monitor spies of sorts. They are focused both on the inside and outside matters opposing all countries neighbouring Armenia, which many regional players have repeatedly brought to light. Moreover, the EU does not share the information that they gather in the region with their Armenian colleagues, because they are after a different goal. They send this information straight to Brussels. For what? No one is hiding the fact that Brussels’ goal in the post-Soviet space is to sow chaos, discord, and strife.
Moreover, the EU and France’s key plan is to expand the range of tasks pursued by the mission in order to get through to the South Caucasus by hook or by crook and to set foot on the ground to make sure regional players, neighbouring countries, or member countries of regional associations do not have a say when it comes to deciding their own future. All the more so, the EU and France have the potential to dictate their will. They are not called “NATO mission,” “headquarters,” or “office” of NATO headquarters. But these countries are NATO members. The observers bring no stability to the region. We have documented accounts of exchanges of fire on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border which is yet another confirmation of the fact that extra regional forces - the EU or France - clearly do nothing to promote peace and prosperity in the South Caucasus, but, instead, create new dividing lines, new hotbeds of tension, and new problems.
Choosing external partners and variables for ensuring national security is, without a doubt, the sovereign right of any nation, Armenia, in this particular case. I think everyone realises that the South Caucasus is seen by the European Union primarily as another frontline of the global hybrid war that they are in the process of unleashing. Previously, their actions focused only on Russia, but look what is happening now.
Trying to subsume Armenia into the orbit of the collective West with vague and invariably illusory prospects, France seeks to undermine the centuries-old Russian-Armenian relations, which have always benefitted the peoples of what was once one country and then became two separate states. Does the mission operated by France and the European Union (again, the issue is about NATO, if we call things for what they are) meet the aspirations, objectives, or interests of the people of Armenia? Of course, it does not. They are not getting anything constructive, positive, or valuable from it, and they never will. Why? The key to the answer is that no one has ever got anything good from the alliance.
Question: In an interview with the ARD television channel, presumptive German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called on Kiev to reverse its strategy in the conflict with Russia by going on the offensive and cited the Crimean Bridge as a key target. What does the Foreign Ministry think about this statement by the German official which is, in fact, an incitement to attack Crimea?
Maria Zakharova: It is an outlandishly immoral thing to say. That brings to mind the terrorist logic of sorts, because it is an openly extremist statement and represents nothing but a throwback to the past.
I will say it differently. With all the above factors in place, how can anyone call for a Ukrainian offensive? Everyone is clear about the desperate plight of the Ukrainian forces and their battalions. That is exactly why they are fiercely attacking civilian infrastructure and civilians. All other options involving counterattacks of all sorts have been used up and have resulted in mass casualties among Ukrainian citizens who were forcibly mobilised by Zelensky into this meat grinder. Considering this, a representative of Germany appears as a key sponsor of the carnage and annihilation of Slavs in our region. What I’m saying is that Germany was a key sponsor when such madmen came to power there. Once again, they are whipping a “half-dead horse” forcing it to get up and throw itself into the breach. What kind of a breach are they talking about?
Take a look at the captured Ukrainian soldiers. They get treated and fed in captivity, and then they themselves say that they were treated like cattle by the Ukrainian forces. What offensive are you talking about?
I think the CDU leader should be clear about the following. Since launching cruise missiles without the direct involvement of Bundeswehr servicemen is impossible, any attack on any Russian critical transport infrastructure (Mr Merz felt quite confident identifying the Crimean Bridge as a target) will be regarded as Germany’s direct participation in hostilities on the side of the Kiev regime with ensuing consequences for Germany.
I used the phrase “on the side of the Kiev regime” for the sake of argument, because the Kiev regime is not a party, but a tool in the crisis concocted by the West.
Question: We have listened to your response to our colleagues’ question concerning Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview, in which he affirmed that Russia and the United States have yet to agree on key parameters for a settlement in Ukraine.
Nonetheless, we wish to explore this discussion from a different perspective and underscore that coordinating these parameters prior to a Russian court ruling on revoking recognition of Ukraine’s independence is impossible. Thus, the peace negotiation process has reached an impasse. How do you envisage the further development of the situation within this context?
Maria Zakharova: Allow me to address your initial assertion. We are not aware of any instance where an individual or entity has petitioned a court to annul the recognition of the independence of former Soviet republics, nor of any judicial consequences arising from such a process having been initiated. Consequently, the remainder of your question is simply irrelevant.
Question: Yet there exists a lawsuit joined by over 600,000 citizens of our nation.
Maria Zakharova: You referred to a court. Have legal proceedings commenced?
Question: The issue is precisely that they have not.
Maria Zakharova: Accordingly, I cannot address the subsequent part of your question. You have linked it to a judicial process.
Question: The Apostolic Nuncio to Ukraine, Archbishop Visvaldas Kulbokas, has stated: “On April 13, 2025, Russian troops shelled the city of Sumy. It was Palm Sunday, and people in the Ukrainian city of Sumy, seemingly of various denominations, were heading to their churches for prayer. As a result of the missile strike, over 30 individuals were killed precisely at the moment they were going to pray, as the strike hit the very centre of the city.” However, we are fully aware that the strike targeted a military facility, resulting in the elimination of AFU militants and mercenaries. How would you comment on this, given that the Holy See and papal media are actively participating in Ukraine’s propaganda campaign and advancing this anti-Russian narrative?
Maria Zakharova: You prefaced your question by noting that the Russian Defence Ministry has already issued an official statement confirming that on April 13, 2025, the Russian Army conducted a missile strike on the assembly point of the command staff of the AFU’s Seversk task force in Sumy, which resulted in the elimination of dozens of AFU servicemen and officers. Specific figures, as disclosed by the Russian Federation’s defence authority, are available for your reference.
I have also previously stated today that all we have heard from Western actors and their lobbied officials in international structures regarding this incident immediately after Russia’s strike constitutes yet another staged and scripted informational “operetta,” whose primary components are falsehoods, hypocrisy, and distortion of reality. Naturally, this is not the first instance of such conduct. These assertions defy all logic, let alone any semblance of moral or ethical values. Civilian populations continue to be exploited first as a human shield for Vladimir Zelensky and his subordinates, then as a pretext for levelling baseless accusations against our country. We have observed this pattern consistently, year after year, not only since 2022 but long before. Meanwhile, factual evidence, such as that which the West itself cited during its assessment of the second Ukrainian “Maidan” in 2014 – namely, who opened fire on peaceful demonstrators – is deliberately ignored. This persists despite admissions by EU representatives that the snipers responsible were affiliated with the Kiev regime.
However, the crux lies elsewhere. Within Ukrainian society, irrespective of political views or affiliations, there has been vigorous debate following the monstrous crime committed by Vladimir Zelensky and his junta regarding how such an act could even occur. Who bears responsibility? Who orchestrated the use of civilians, women, and children to fabricate yet another staged provocation aimed at accusing Russia and presenting it, primarily to Washington, as alleged evidence of Russian violations? Beyond this lies the usual untranslatable wordplay.
You witness the fierce polemics now unfolding in Ukrainian society. People are seeking culprits. They demand answers. How could events involving large numbers of military personnel be organised in the centre of a densely populated city on the Orthodox feast of Palm Sunday? This question preoccupies everyone. Why were women and children – though I am uncertain if they were invited but rather assigned – present at these gatherings? The public is beginning to demand accountability.
The recent remarks by the Apostolic Nuncio to Ukraine, marked by overt bias, can only provoke bewilderment and regret, particularly given the Holy See’s generally balanced official stance and Pope Francis’s repeated demonstrations of understanding toward the root causes of the current conflict. His Holiness has consistently expressed readiness to facilitate resolution through political and diplomatic means rather than inflaming tensions.
In their recent telephone conversation, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Vatican Secretary for Relations with States Paul Richard Gallagher discussed the Ukrainian crisis and prospects for its resolution based on the Russian Federation’s established approaches. Both sides reaffirmed mutual interest in continuing constructive dialogue.
Instead of issuing politicised and unsubstantiated statements that contravene Vatican’s line to appease transient political agendas, Visvaldas Kulbokas would be better advised to focus his efforts on tasks befitting his diplomatic mission in Kiev.
It is not my role to instruct him. Presumably, he receives guidance from Vatican authorities on how to conduct his duties. Yet if he insists on imposing his views upon us, it would be fitting to reciprocate with recommendations. He could, for instance, contribute to persuading Kiev’s authorities to honour their declared moratorium on strikes against fuel and energy facilities – a commitment Vladimir Zelensky endorsed and verbally affirmed. He might engage with the Kiev regime to halt its daily mass attacks on civilian infrastructure within Russia. He could urge Kiev to revoke its legislative ban on negotiations with Russia.
I think there remains another sphere directly within the Apostolic Nuncio’s purview in Ukraine: the staggering cynicism with which the Kiev regime persecutes and destroys the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Here, a representative of the Christian faith could find meaningful work. He witnesses firsthand the demolition of Ukrainian Orthodox parishes, the moral and physical suffering of congregants – including repression and murder – and the desecration of holy sites belonging to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and thus to global Christendom. Yet, inexplicably, he shows no interest. I have outlined potential avenues for his engagement, both during and beyond office hours.
Question: How can you describe the situation concerning Orthodox shrines in the Middle East? How safe are they?
Maria Zakharova: The aggravated military-political situation in certain Middle Eastern countries, above all the steep escalation in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict zone as well as increasing socio-economic problems, have an obvious negative effect on various ethno-confessional groups living there, including the fairly large Christian community. There are a lot of people there who practice Christianity.
Of special concern is the situation in the Holy Land, home to most of the Orthodox shrines in the Middle East. We are talking about Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon.
The Foreign Ministry and the Russian Orthodox Church maintain close contacts with the local authorities and leaders of the Christian denominations with a view to provide the necessary support for the Christian population in the Middle East, including in restoring the churches, educational institutions, and other religious sites destroyed in the hostilities.
Christians in the Middle East also receive substantial comprehensive assistance from the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society, the Foundation for the Support of Christian Culture and Heritage established by Rosatom State Corporation, and other Russian non-governmental organisations as well as religious and cultural associations, which, in particular, resulted in the Orthodox heritage sites in Jerusalem being restored and improved. Our concerned citizens send humanitarian aid, provide financial support, and say their prayers.
