Speech by the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the session of the Civil Society Forum, Rome, 25th November 2013

I hereby welcome the participants of the session of the Civil Society Forum. I think that it is a very good initiative. The fact that this event marks the beginning of a very important visit of the President of Russia Vladimir Putin to Italy, is a rather symbolic one. It is also symbolic that its second part – the Business Forum – will close this programme, thus highlighting the multi-profile nature of our co-operation; which is participated in by State institutions, businesses, civil society, mass media and the youth. We value the contribution of Russian civil society in the implementation of its foreign policy course, and its formation. We meet with representatives of NGOs regularly, and they show interest in the issues which are discussed in the international arena, including international organisations. The Russian Foreign Minister, his deputies, and the directors of respective departments have conducted such meetings on a regular basis for a year. With this, even when we are merely asked questions, we feel a new dimension of the old problem and we can look at it in a new way. Not only are we frequently asked questions about our line and position; we also propose ideas which are guided by a desire to resolve a particular issue in a faster way and to continue negotiations more effectively. Many of these ideas also help us think in a creative way. The State is ready to make the civil society participate more actively in these processes and in international dialogue on the basis of a thrilling agenda; in particular, the Russian International Affairs Council, a structure which was created to assist in foreign policy dialogue between inhabitants and specialists, and political analysts. Gorchakov's Public Diplomacy Support Fund was created for the same purposes. It is already known that Konstantin Kosachev is a head of the Federal Agency for the Commonwealth of Independent States, Compatriots Living Abroad and International Humanitarian Cooperation (Rossotrudnichestvo), whose task is to encourage interaction, primarily with our neighbours but also with all countries of the world on behalf of the State. The Fund to Support and Protect the Rights of Compatriots Living Abroad is in place for those of our nationals who get into complicated situations due to one reason or another.

I know that the Forum is celebrating its ten-year anniversary this year. I would like to congratulate you and the co-chairpersons on this wonderful event. I think that it is a very good, in-demand arena for the development of co-operation between our civil societies. Regarding the most acute topic discussed in the world today which you have chosen for discussion – the situation in the Middle East and North Africa / normalisation of things in this region is a priority task for us. The way things will continue in this large area spanning two continents following the appropriation of means to settle various conflicts in this region (both simmering and smoldering), will determine not only the future of the Middle East and North Africa and certain countries, but international stability in general, as well as how international law and the norms on which the UN is based will continue to be perceived. Like our Italian friends, we saw the Arab people's aspiration to a better, freer life, and changing economic welfare, which have marked the region. Unfortunately, the events do not live up to expectations. However, the conclusion made by many people in the earliest days of the Arab spring i.e. the best way to implement transformation is through evolution rather than revolution has been confirmed. Not through splits and aggravation of confrontation, but through national dialogue; avoiding abrupt movements and, of course, violence. We insisted and continue to insist that the people of the region should primarily seek to resolve their problems themselves – determine their fate and the fate of their countries themselves, while external players must refrain from attempts to interfere in these processes, avoid imposing their own solutions which do not take into consideration the historical, religious and other traditions of these people. People are able to determine their fate themselves, without external interference. We traditionally have friendly ties with this region. We are interested in seeing the Middle East become a flourishing part of the world.

Emma Bonino has just told us about the build-up of confrontations in the region. Our joint goal should unite us all; however, we have still not observed the start of a movement toward a flourishing, peaceful and stable Middle East. Confrontations are multiplying: interethnic and interreligious ones, between Arabs, Kurds, Muslims, and Christians. We are worried about the fate of Christians who are fleeing Syria. Two thousand years of Christian history in the Middle East should not stop. We must undertake necessary steps. We support the initiative of the Russian Orthodox Church to hold an international conference between spiritual leaders of Orthodox Christianity, Islam and Judaism for the purpose of talking about topics concerning joint living in the land which is sacred for all these religions; this should be held next year. As has already been correctly asserted, contradictions within Islam have aggravated. Not only between Sunnis and Shiites, but also inside the Sunni camp, where, according to certain reports received, the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists already have different approaches to the Syrian crisis, etc. At one point, about 8 to 10 years ago, a representative conference of the leading Muslim scholars was held in Jordan, the essence of which was very simple: all Muslims are the same and equal. I am convinced that it is in our joint interests to return the Islamic world to this philosophy and overcome internal contradictions. Islam is one of the greatest, key monotheist religions. We are interested in dialogue between civilisations / religions; we usually assist this in all possible ways. The situation in Syria and our ability to settle it is the touchstone of our ability to prevent such splits between and within civilisatios. The first steps have been made – chemical weapons in Syria are being eliminated. The work goes on in a pragmatic way, without any politicisation. Experts knowingly determine steps which must be undertaken, and the time which is required for one step or another. The so-called "iron" has already been destroyed – I'm talking about the machines for producing chemical weapons, which is already a big step. Right now we are resolving practical aspects which are related to the concentration of all stockpiles of poisonous weapons, and their transportation and removal from the country. Issues regarding the elimination of these poisonous substances outside the country are also being resolved. Nobody doubts that the work of the implementation of decisions of the Executive Committee of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and the UNSC resolution is being implemented successfully – there is no doubt that the work will be finished successfully. I have heard several assessments that only the adoption of a resolution in support of the OPCW decision for the elimination of chemical weapons, allowed the UNSC overcome the "paralysis". The Security Council adopted several decisions concerning the Syrian crisis. The first of them was initiated by Russia in August 2011. It was an extended statement of the President of the Security Council, which contained an appeal to the parties to cease violence immediately and to sit at the negotiation table. Unfortunately, the parties have not listened. Then the UNSC supported the initiative of the LAS, which accepted LAS observers in its territory based on the consent of the SAR Government, which was received through our mediation. Unfortunately, these observers were removed after a month of work the work they did. Those who sent them did not like that they composed their reports more or less objectively, and did not "throw balls and pucks only into the perimeters of the SAR Government". After that, the Security Council adopted a resolution in support of Kofi Annan's plan, and then another resolution about sending UN observers to Syria to contribute to the implementation of the six-item plan proposed by Kofi Annan. With this, the Security Council was not paralysed. To develop Kofi Annan's plan, the Geneva conference was convened on 30th June 2012 with our active participation and the Geneva Communiqué was adopted; this has become the "guiding star" on the way to the settlement and appeal to implement it fully. After that, we brought this Communiqué to the UNSC and proposed to have it approved as it is (in the form which was agreed by consensus of all the five permanent members of the Security Council, the LAS, the EU, Turkey and the UN), but our Western partners said that they did not want to approve it, because it was necessary to add that the President of Syria Bashar al-Assad must stand down, as well as to add that there should be sanctions against the regime. None of this was included in the Geneva Communiqué, because any confrontation approaches would only aggravate the situation. About half a year passed before the US Secretary of State John Kerry came to Moscow in May, and we managed to return to the idea of the implementation of the Geneva Communiqué. The Russian-American initiative to convene the Geneva-2 conference for these purposes was proclaimed. However, one hour ago we did not have a date of the proposed conference, but we have it now – 22nd January 2014. The date was proposed by the UN Secretary-General. We could have done it much earlier if the opposition felt responsible for their country, and would not set any preconditions when we tried to convene the conference in September, and then in October, November and December. There were preconditions each time: "Bashar al-Assad must go", "we need to restore military domination ‘on the ground' ", "give us the date of the resignation of the SAR Government". This has nothing to do with the fate of their people and their country; rather, it's about political egoism. In our contacts (and we contact the government and all opposition groups on a regular basis) we attempt to postulate a very simple thought that they need to sit and agree.

I know that not everybody likes the idea of the conference, and that attempts are made (as before, and undoubtedly will continue to be undertaken) to complicate or even disrupt its preparation. However, we cannot delay the announcement of its date any more. The opposition and its sponsors, like the SAR Government, must become aware of their responsibilities before their people. We continue to hear statements that the conference is senseless and that we need to continue the war with the regime, even today. We hear about this initiative being useless, because the parties will never agree. The Geneva Communiqué states that they must determine how to continue living on the basis of mutual consent; then the government and the opposition have veto, and they can never agree. The situation is very complicated, emotions are maximally intense, positions are antagonised. But, if we do not make the parties sit at the negotiation table and tell them that they need to agree, we will not know whether or not this chance will work. We have this chance, and it would be a big mistake to neglect it. Further delays in negotiations only multiply the number of victims, and allow international terrorists to strengthen their positions in Syria and in the region in general, and brood over plans about a caliphate which actually covers all of North Africa. Of course, the humanitarian crisis has been aggravated, as Emma Bonino has mentioned. The UNSC worked on a resolution envisaging a special decision on the humanitarian crisis. This work was stopped by our Western colleagues in the Security Council after the incident of 21st August. It is unclear why do we need to interrupt such important negotiations. Finally, it was only at the end of October that an extended statement was adopted, which listed all the tasks to be resolved to ease the situation for civilians. Like in the case with chemical weapons, when fabricated or inaccurately collected facts were used as a basis for establishing requirements for the West to start a war against the regime, there are those who wish to show the situation in the humanitarian area in the SAR in such a way as to make it a pretext for external interference. We take this very seriously. Today we have another Russian-American meeting in Geneva, which includes the participation of the Special Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, envisaging further involvement of other UNSC members, Turkey and the LAS to coordinate organisational moments of the conference. We had the previous meeting on 5th November, after which our delegation invited the heads of all humanitarian agencies working in the SAR. None of them seemed to be facing an insolvable problem. None of them showed any signs of panic. They talked about problems in Syria, and how they resolve them, and where their government assists them (in many cases they assess their assistance as satisfactory) and where they need more support from the Government, doing it all in a professional and honest way. We transferred these signals to Syrians, as we always do. Additional measures to ease the issue of visas for employees of humanitarian institutions and the procedure of delivery of aid over the border (not to bring it to Damascus each time) etc. were adopted just recently. When I say all this, I am not trying to play down the acuteness of the Syrian crisis – not at all. We now have about 2 million refugees and even more internally displaced persons. For example, at the meeting which I am talking about, a representative of the International Organisation for Migration said that, according to their statistics, refugees have started to return to the regions which have been freed from terrorists. Several dozens of thousands returned from Jordan. We can discharge emotions and passions, of course; but I respect people who resolve actual problems. A couple of weeks ago there was hysteria about the epidemic of poliomyelitis in Syria – an intervention body should be introduced, hospitals should be closed off, etc. It's all about occupation, this time for medical purposes. We immediately checked it with the WHO, and it turned out that there were only ten such cases. But despite this small number, vaccines were sent and given to children. With this, we need to work if we really do care about civilians.

We value the principled position of Rome that there are no prospects of attempts of forceful interference, as well as the fact that it is unacceptable to participate in arming of extremist groups. We will continue to exchange opinions with our Italian partners, compare our positions, and attempt to promote constructive approaches. Although our positions will never match 100%, they never do with anybody, because each party has its own peculiarities. In any case, we assume (here is our solidarity with Italy again) that the Syrian problem, no matter how acute it is, cannot and should not share in other problems in the region, primarily the Palestinian-Israeli and the Arab-Israeli conflict. We are convinced that the non-settlement of the Palestinian problem has been the main cause for the development of groups of extremists and terrorists for many decades, as jihadists continue to recruit youths using slogans of unfair attitude toward the Palestinian people: a decision was made to create two countries in 1947, but they created only one; they will never create the other. Youths from poor families in conditions of unemployment respond to this propaganda well and become part of those we have to fight later; not only in the region, but also in Italy, Russia, the United States and other countries in the West. Our joint task is to make the direct negotiation process between Palestinians and Israelis, which started through the mediation of the United States, successful. We actively supported the activity of Americans, and have stopped the activity of the so-called Quartet for half a year, which did not add to its reputation. But we had faith in the efforts which were being undertaken. The process has renewed, but it goes on with difficulty. Usually we do not talk about details, but Palestinian negotiators even threatened to resign publicly. I do not know whether they did it or not. However, in any case, we need to resolve this problem as soon as possible; not with the isolation of the Gaza Strip, as some parties attempt to do, but by contributing to efforts to restore Palestinian unity, as Egypt does. Because the decision reached by all the Palestinian people will be more stable long-term (including as far as the security of Israel is concerned) than the decision which will be rejected by the Gaza Strip which is ruled by Hamas. Russia never understands attempts to exclude anybody from the negotiation process. We are in favour of the policy of involvement for the purpose of settling conflicts. Hamas must be involved in this process. We must help restore Palestinian unity on the platform of the Palestine Liberation Organisation and the Arab Peace Initiative, which envisages the recognition of Israel in the context of comprehensive settlement. In the same way, it was an involvement method rather than an isolation method which allowed for agreement regarding chemical weapons in Syria. Finally, the same method also worked in respect of Iran's Nuclear Programme, when the P5+1 international mediators stopped relying on threats, pressure and sanctions only, and drew Iran into a real rather than theatrical negotiation process. We actively contributed to this, and have been speaking about it all these years. We are convinced – and it is written in the Foreign Policy Concept of Russia – that we can settle Iran's nuclear problem only with acknowledgement of the undeniable right of the Islamic Republic of Iran to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, including its right to enrich uranium; provided that it solves all its problems with the IAEA and has its peaceful nuclear programme subject to the strict control of the Agency. This formula opens the document, which has been approved in Geneva. The second thing which we tried to achieve and promote within the framework of the EU3+3, was the application of the superposition and reciprocity principle in the resolution of INP. In other words, there should be no package which would immediately eradicate all the issues at once. This is unrealistic, for trust should be sufficiently disrupted. We need "action for action": Iran does what the international community (represented by the IAEA and the UNSC) requests from it, but the other party relieves the burden of sanctions. This superposition and reciprocity principle is also formalised in the document.

Patience and refusal of breaks and nervousness are also the virtues of diplomats. We value highly that our partners from the EU3+3 have shown these virtues and stood their ground over many hours, almost a day-long marathon. And at the end we managed to achieve this result through mutual respect and a willingness to understand the actual legal interests of each party, through involvement of Iran. I think that full implementation of this agreement, which we still have to implement, is extremely specific and verifiable; it will allow for the enforcement of the legal rights of Iran, strengthen the regime of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, and increase the security of all countries of the region, including Israel, which is very important for us. We confirmed our position during the recent visit of the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Russia again. Like Syrian chemical disarmament, the resolution of the INP problem will move in the direction of the task set by the international community long ago – the creation of a WMD free zone in the Middle East. If the agreement on Iran will be implemented, then the cause which is used as a pretext for the creation of the European segment of the anti-missile defence will be invalidated. Many things are interrelated with this particular issue. This may interfere with the interests of many parties, when you consider the "rings in the water which will appear" when it comes to positive development of the situation on the basis of this agreement (and this agreement is a breakthrough agreement). Maybe it will help us gain a better understanding of why some parts of the world resisted negotiations on INP so strongly. I repeat that we are convinced that this agreement is beneficial for everybody: its implementation will result in the strictest control of INP by the IAEA, and ensure that it will be peaceful and nothing but. We hope that the situation in the region will strengthen, and will try to achieve this, including the matter of the security of Israel. This is the key to stability in the entire region. There is no other way to achieve this.

This is the same method of involvement of countries and parties which allowed the resolution of the problem of Syrian chemical weapons, and agreement on the INP; and we need to follow it in our preparation for the Geneva conference on Syria. Primarily, Syrians must be widely represented. The UNSC resolution states that all the strata of Syrian society should be represented, and that the dialogue between them must be truly representative. Secondly, the circle of external participants who must be present at the opening of the conference, must be comprehensive, although we then need to leave Syrian parties with Lakhdar Brahimi if they are to start agreeing directly. All those who affect the situation must certainly be invited. This especially concerns countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia, especially because the deepening split within Islam is associated with these two countries. Frankly speaking, there is no serious belief that the Syrian government will represent Iran, because it does what Iran tells it. We will speak in favour of the representation of everyone who actually affects the situation at the conference. I will switch to the role of mass media in the modern world – it is ambiguous. There are problems related to access to information which sometimes leave us not interested in accessing knowledge. This is a truly serious problem. How do the freedom of opinion and confidentiality and ethical aspects of the information community correlate? We master norms of civilised regulation of mass media activities. We have more than 88,000 of them. I think that we always need to attempt to ensure high standards in journalism. The national journalism school has the richest traditions, which, thank God, are still alive. There must be responsibility for information, and the safety of journalists should be defended when they do what they have to do. We are currently reviewing additional measures for this in the State Duma. We wish to enforce fundamental human rights in the global information arena as they are envisaged by the Constitution of the Russian Federation and other laws; ensuring immunity of private life, the privacy of correspondence and the protection of personal data. We need to use the newest instruments of interactive communication between people responsibly. Freedom in the information arena, including the Internet, does not exclude, but rather envisages its regulation and the enforcement of the fundamental rights and obligations of users and organisers. The Internet is being regulated. The topic of democratic resolution of the issue of regulation of the Internet at perennial sessions within the framework of the International Telecommunication Union, is advancing very slowly. But it is happening. We support the proposition for the development of some sort of a code of conduct for the information society under the aegis of the UN and its specialised bodies. The German-Brazilian initiative, which is currently being promoted at the UN General Assembly by delegations of the two countries, has the same idea. It would be ideal if representatives of civil society made their contribution toward the formation of a new information order which would be based on the principle that the enforcement of rights and freedoms by one subject of social relations must not harm / cause detriment to the rights and legal interests of others. Russia aspires to attain such order. Amendments revolving around the protection of children on the Internet were recently adopted in Russian legislation. Like in the area of security, when we agree (in the OSCE and the NATO / Russia Council) that the situation is an undivided one and that nobody will ameliorate their security to the detriment of security of others, the same approach should be used in respect of freedom in the information arena. A great person once said that freedom means to observe the law. Maybe this phrase could be criticised, but it has a certain kind of value. At least, human experience tells us that agreements help us live in peace and avoid conflicts. We welcome the strengthening of contacts between youths in all possible ways. The strength of our relations in the future, and the extent to which we will be able to yield success through these friendly ties, depends on them. It is good that the youth show interest in mutual contacts. We have a good legal framework: we signed the Agreement on the cooperation of youth affairs in 2001, on the basis of which about twenty Russian regions participate in these contacts. The agreement on the reciprocal recognition of education documents issued by Russian and Italian universities, which was signed at the end of 2009, must play an important role. Russia ratified it in 2010. We hope that Italy will finish its ratification very soon, because then our graduates will be able to study in your universities to continue their education, prepare theses, obtain scientific degrees, etc. Other documents are also aimed at the promotion of the aspiration of young people to study each other's languages. We have an agreement concerning the study of Russian in Italy and of Italian in Russia: the Memorandum on the organisation of bilingual education in schools, whereby lessons are taught in Russian and Italian. Therefore, governments of the two countries established a good legal framework for youths to implement their aspiration to mutual communication. Italian Foreign Minister Emma Bonino and I actively appeal to you in this respect.