Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks and answers to questions at a joint news conference following talks with French Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Development Jean-Marc Ayrault Moscow, April 19, 2016

Ladies and gentlemen,

We are happy to welcome to Moscow a delegation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development of France led by Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault. This is the first time that Mr Ayrault has come to Moscow in his new capacity, but he has been here before, including as the prime minister of France. Mr Ayrault has greatly contributed and continues to contribute to the development of Russia-France cooperation. We also met several times on the sidelines of multilateral events. Today we have agreed to maintain our close ties on a wide range of issues on our agenda.

Mr Ayrault has a very busy schedule in Moscow. Before our talks today, he met and had a long and very detailed discussion with President of Russia Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. Our bilateral talks took place in a businesslike and constructive atmosphere.

We are glad to note positive shifts in the development of our bilateral relations. We carry on our dialogue at the top level and also relations between the foreign ministers and other diplomats. Contacts between our parliament speakers and heads of ministries and agencies have intensified visibly.

We stated our satisfaction with the high level of bilateral cooperation in high-tech industries, including aircraft manufacturing and space exploration, transport, oil and gas infrastructure, nuclear generation and the automobile industry. French businesses have not lost their interest in maintaining close business interaction with their Russian partners. It is notable that none of the French companies working in Russia, and there are about 500 of them, have pulled out of the Russian market despite the current objective and subjective problems.

We expect to hold the next meeting of the intergovernmental commission co-chaired by our prime ministers, who have coordinated this meeting, by the end of the year to discuss ways to stop the decline in mutual trade, something that is not in the interest of either Russia or France.

This year we will celebrate 50 years of bilateral cooperation in space exploration. We have achieved considerable results in this sphere. In 2011, we started implementing a programme aimed at launching Russia’s Soyuz carrier rockets from the Kourou site in French Guiana, and have launched 13 rockets since then. In November this year, we plan to launch a Soyuz rocket with French astronaut Thomas Pesquet from Baikonur in Kazakhstan.

Our cultural relations have been developing consistently. In early April, we launched a new bilateral project, the Cross-Year of Cultural Tourism, which will continue until mid-2017. The intergovernmental Agreement on the Mutual Recognition of Education, Qualifications and Academic Degrees, which has recently come into force, will help boost contacts in this sphere and ties between people in general. In autumn, we plan to hold the opening ceremony of the Russian Spiritual and Cultural Centre on Quai Branly in Paris. We regard this as fresh evidence of the friendship and sympathy between our people.

We have had a detailed exchange of opinions on a wide range of global issues. We focused on the need to mobilise the international community towards settling conflicts and crises and fighting terrorism. This issue featured prominently on the agenda of President Francois Hollande’s visit to Russia last November and during the subsequent contacts between our military and security agencies. We will continue to coordinate our counterterrorism efforts, including at the UN Security Council and at the bilateral level. In particular, we have reached agreement on the resumption of the Russian-French working group to counter new challenges and threats.

We exchanged detailed analysis of the events in Syria and around it, including our cooperation within the International Syria Support Group (ISSG), which is based on plans approved by UN Security Council resolutions. We agreed to continue promoting compliance with the ceasefire plan, to try to stop the violations, and to expedite relief aid to those that need it. We paid particular attention to the political process that was started in Geneva. We think it’s necessary to nationalise this process and make sure the Syrian Government and all of the opposition groups have the opportunity to sit at the negotiating table and start determining the fate of their country as required by the UNSC resolution.

We also discussed the situations in Libya, Iraq and other countries in the region. The common approach here is the need for the outside parties to do their best to encourage all sides in each of these countries and in each of these situations to move towards national reconciliation and national accord while consolidating their efforts in the fight against terrorists and extremists.

We reviewed our cooperation within the Normandy format, which is to manage the implementation of the Minsk Agreements of February 12, 2015. The key to implementing these agreements is to establish a direct dialogue between Kiev and Donbass, secure this region’s special status, introduce the relevant amendments to the Ukrainian Constitution, offer a real amnesty, and coordinate local elections. We hope that the new Ukrainian Government will address these issues more actively than its predecessor, especially since, judging by all appearances, there are no differences between President Petr Poroshenko and Prime Minister Vladimir Groysman, that can’t be overcome, nor are they likely to appear in the future.

We have exchanged opinions on what is going on between Russia and the EU. We are confident that it is in the interests of all countries – both Russia and the EU members – to strengthen the foundations of a future-oriented partnership in most areas. Russia is prepared for this, but it will accept neither attempts to do business as if nothing has happened, nor double standards, nor unilateral actions, nor attempts to create new divides in Europe. We believe that addressing all these objectives while looking towards the political horizon would promote a dialogue between the EU and the EAEU and, more generally, a discussion of the prospects for an economic and humanitarian space from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean with reliance on equal and indivisible security.  

Tomorrow, the Russia-NATO Council will hold a meeting at the permanent representative level after a long lull. We have accepted the proposal submitted by the North Atlantic Alliance that originally introduced the freeze on contact but now thought it necessary to approach us with this proposal. We made it clear that it would not be business as usual or a one-sided game. The agenda that has been approved for tomorrow’s meeting reflects not only what NATO wants but also what is of interest to the Russian Federation. We’ll certainly let the media know how it goes.

We compared notes on the OSCE’s current activities, primarily the most important problem, the operations of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission in Ukraine and the Organisation’s involvement in the Contact Group and its subgroups as they look for ways to reach an agreement, without exception, on the steps that need to be taken by both Kiev and Donbass to implement the Minsk Agreements in a full and unconditional manner.

We have arranged to maintain contact on these and other issues on our agenda. I’m confident that today’s talks were very useful.

Question: Do you believe that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad can win this war?

Sergey Lavrov: The answer to this question is very simple – no one can win this war, all analysts and the parties to the conflict admit this. True, some external players still cherish the dream of overthrowing the regime by force and strive to do everything possible to that end, including attempts to deliberately torpedo the Geneva talks. As I see it, the United States, which co-chairs the International Syria Support Group together with Russia, France and other countries, members of this Group, emphatically disagree with these attempts. A striving to predetermine something for the people of Syria runs counter to our agreements reached at meetings of the International Syria Support Group and the UN Security Council, including UNSC Resolution 2254. I tirelessly quote its passage saying that only “the Syrian people will decide the future of Syria.” For this purpose, it is essential to maintain direct dialogue between the government delegation and all members of the opposition without exception.

No opposition group, including groups from Riyadh, the so-called Moscow-Cairo Group, Hmeymim and independent groups, has a monopoly right to unilaterally represent the opponents of the incumbent Damascus regime. The decisions of the International Syria Support Group and UN Security Council resolutions underscore precisely the all-inclusive nature of the negotiating process and also note that only a peaceful solution is possible. By the way, when these documents were being coordinated, Russia, France and the United States insisted on adding a clause that there is no and can be no military solution to the Syrian conflict. Unfortunately, certain representatives of the Middle East region did not allow this phrase to be included in the text. I will not go into details because I think everyone understands what this is all about. It is an established fact that an absolute minority shares this utterly hopeless stance. We will do our best to prevent a military solution and a reliance on military force from prevailing because this would spell final chaos in the region and wreck yet another state after what had been done to Iraq and Libya. Nor should we forget that the situation in Yemen is not very good either. We need to bring to account those harbouring such plans.

Before I give the floor to Jean-Marc Ayrault, I would like to quote what he has just said in his speech, while expressing hope that Russia will help resolve the crisis in Syria. He said that the Russian Federation maintains long-standing ties with Damascus. I daresay that France maintains equally close long-standing ties with Damascus, including a period when this territory was administered by France, together with other territories, under a League of Nations mandate. The current structure of the Syrian state evolved precisely under the French administration, and the role of the Alawites in this structure was also determined.

We hope that France will continue to strive to form and preserve such a statehood in Syria that would provide a comfortable and safe existence to all ethnic groups and religious denominations without exception in new conditions when it is clear that time is ripe for change.

Question (addressed to Jean-Marc Ayrault): The Russia-NATO Council is to hold a meeting at the level of permanent representatives in Brussels tomorrow. This will be the first meeting after a long lull, following the Alliance’s decision to put its relations with Russia on hold. At Russia’s initiative, the participants will discuss the fight against terrorism. Paris and Brussels were the scenes of atrocious terrorist attacks in the last six months. Don’t you think that much time has been lost as NATO refrained from active cooperation with Russia in this area? When will the Russia-NATO Council be able to revert to full-scale operations? How comfortable does France feel within the Alliance, given that your country repeatedly changed its attitude to NATO membership?

Sergey Lavrov (speaking after Jean-Marc Ayrault): I’d like to confirm that France was one of the countries that supported our proposal to augment NATO’s original agenda with counterterrorism efforts. This subject is related to Afghanistan’s problems and all the threats emanating from that country. I think that this could be formulated more broadly. The original proposals submitted by NATO Secretariat were much more modest. They wanted to discuss Ukraine and avoidance of unforeseen incidents. We have consented to Ukraine as an agenda item, all the more so since we have a lot of questions regarding the role played in the Ukraine crisis by certain NATO countries, which were fomenting the crisis and abetting the extremists and radical nationalists.

Where the dangerous military activities are concerned, we are ready to consider these, but we have agreed that this should be done in the context of a discussion dedicated to the overall military situation in the Euro-Atlantic area, in the space occupied by Russia and the Alliance, and primarily on borders between Russia and NATO. It is very difficult to come to agreement on secondary matters until we have clarity on global issues. We should understand where the military and political situation in the region is heading and what aims are pursued by NATO as it continues its steady expansion eastward and brings its military infrastructure closer to Russia’s borders. We are thankful to those NATO countries that have backed this more fundamental agenda, which will be discussed tomorrow. We are confident that France will continue to adhere to the constructive positions aimed at overcoming the crisis in relations between Russia and the West.    

Question: Do you see France’s desire to meet with members of Russian civil society as evidence of a critical attitude towards Russian authorities?

Sergey Lavrov: We aren’t troubled by the fact that our guests meet with members of our civil society or the opposition. We consider this normal. Foreign embassies should work with the leading parties, the authorities and the opposition. This is global practice. The main requirement is to avoid double standards, because after our Western colleagues visit Russia they are always asked whether they met with members of our civil society. But when we meet with members of opposition parties, including parliamentary parties in Europe, parties that stand in opposition to the government, we are asked why we meet with people on the fringe and fuel confrontation in Europe. This is a real problem. As Jean-Mark Ayrault said, you must not only see the speck in your brother’s eye but also see the speck, let alone the beam in your own eye.

Indeed, Russia, France and other countries can do more to protect human rights and constitutional freedoms. There is a human rights commissioner in Russia who issues annual reports on human rights in Russia. They are available. I don’t know if all EU countries have a similar office, but we do have it in Russia. Of course, it’s not perfect, and no one says it is, but we do have this office, it enjoys the support of the President and other authorities in Russia and is playing a major role in the dialogue between the Government and civil society, including when dealing with problems any country can encounter. We’d sincerely wish that no double standards are used in this sphere either.

A dialogue on human rights was one of our many sectoral dialogues with the EU. The EU has cut all these dialogues off. They recently said that all of these dialogues would remain suspended with the exception of the dialogue on human rights, which they proposed resuming. This is simply not done. If you want to resume relations, they should be resumed in their entirety. We are waiting for the party that shut the door to do something to reopen it. In addition to our dialogue with the EU, we also maintained and continue to maintain bilateral human rights debates with our partners. Mr Ayrault said, and we agree, we don’t need to lecture each other so as to be able to tell the media that we are not afraid to shoot straight in relations with our partners. What we need is to really help governments improve their operation.

One example. When the issue of human rights in Russia is raised, Nadezhda Savchenko is the only person our Western partners in Europe and across the ocean talk about. No one seems to remember that Russian journalists were killed in Ukraine. Our Western partners don’t like to say in public that the death of our journalists is not being investigated. Maybe they discuss this with their Ukrainian counterparts, but I’ve never heard them say anything in public that could be interpreted as evidence of their interest in investigating the death of Russian journalists, the murder of opposition politician Oles Buzina, who was killed a year ago, or the recent murder of Yury Grabovsky, the lawyer of Russian citizens who were under investigation in Ukraine. The Council of Europe even had to publicly express its discontent over the lack of action in investigating the killings on Maidan Square by sharpshooters in February 2014, the Odessa massacre in May 2014, or many other tragic events in the Ukrainian crisis.

There are venues where we can work together. Take the UN Human Rights Council and its system of annual reports, under which all countries are obliged to report on their actions. We are willing to work. The main point is that all of us should focus on helping to remove shortcomings in the area of human rights no matter where it happens, but not for the sake of publicity.

Question: Representatives of the Riyadh opposition group propose to freeze the talks, since the so-called moderate opposition, including representatives of Ahrar ash-Sham and Jaysh al-Islam, had said that the peace process and the ceasefire should be suspended and hostilities renewed. What could be the consequences if these intentions materialise? Is there a possibility for the ISSG to meet in Geneva on April 21 against this backdrop, and at what level could this meeting be held?

Sergey Lavrov: We have already discussed this issue today. I touched upon this subject during my opening remarks. The Riyadh group, even though it met in Riyadh, was actually backed by Turkey. Everyone knows that. It acts capriciously and was clearly spoiled by its external patrons, having taken into its head that it is the only possible representative of the Syrian opposition, while all others are “lower-grade” opposition, whose opinion should not be taken into account during the talks. They also pretend that they can insist on shaping the agenda of the talks by saying that in order for the talks to begin it has to be clearly stated when and how President of Syria Bashar al-Assad will leave office. They even pretend that this has to happen as per a UN Security Council resolution. Everyone understands that this is a blatant lie.

Let me repeat that this spoiled opposition group is beginning to call the tunes. I know that our Western partners are starting to feel the uneasiness of this situation and understand that we should not be held hostage by those who are determined to derail the peace process and create conditions that would justify a scenario of armed confrontation. These attempts should be severely quelled.

Talks have not been frozen. Apart from the Riyadh group, they include the delegations of the Syrian Government and groups that met in Moscow, Cairo, Astana, the so-called Hmeymim or “independent” group. We assume that the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura continues his efforts of shuttle diplomacy with those who do not seek ultimatums or preconditions that are inconsistent with the requirements of the UN Security Council.

As for Ahrar ash-Sham and Jaysh al-Islam that you’ve mentioned as being moderate groups, when the UN Security Council examined this issue, Russia wanted to list them as terrorist and extremist groups. At that time, our Western partners mostly shared this view, but nevertheless asked us to compromise, arguing that some countries in the region vehemently opposed attempts to designate these groups as terrorist organisations. We acquiesced to it in order to move forward, be it slightly. However, the UN Security Council resolution and the ISSG decision stipulate that apart from ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra, which everyone agrees are terrorist groups, this list could be expanded to include other organisations, primarily those that do not respect the ceasefire. Statements on the withdrawal from the ceasefire arrangement create legal grounds for taking up this issue. In addition, if we are talking about updating the list of terrorist groups, there is sufficient evidence showing that Jabhat al-Nusra is trying to morph into other forms and hide behind other names by merging with smaller groups that are not on the terrorist list, thereby trying to avoid retribution. We are currently summing up facts we receive from various channels. I’m confident that in the near future we will ask the UN Security Council to list as terrorist groups those who undermine the truce and try to hide behind new names along with ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra.

Regarding the ISSG meeting, this group is operating in Geneva at the level of permanent representatives with two task forces: the ceasefire task force and the humanitarian task force. They meet almost every other day. I think that this is what the media refer to when talking about the April 21 meeting. At this stage, the ministerial meeting is not on the agenda. We believe that the mechanism that has been set up and is functioning in Geneva is quite efficient, ensuring that the situation remains under control and all the issues that emerge are addressed. Of course, ministers will have to step in when a need to radically change our approaches or update the mandate of the UN Security Council arises.

Question: The Verkhovna Rada speaker declared that the legislature should remove the clause on the special status for Donbass from the draft law on amending the Ukrainian Constitution. Simultaneously, the new prime minister suggested creating a ministry for the “antiterrorist operation” and the “occupied territories.” What is your take on this? How does this tally with the Minsk Agreements?

Sergey Lavrov: We have just mentioned what we discussed during our talks. Russia and France hope that the new Ukrainian government, which will not butt heads with the president, like the Yatsenyuk government did, will be aimed at both the reforms and full-scale fulfilment of Kiev’s commitments under the Minsk Agreements. Our Western partners confirm this stance. For understandable reasons, they have much more influence on Kiev than we do. We hope that the plans expressed in the statements you have just quoted will be cut short. I mean the new Verkhovna Rada demand to remove the clause on the special status for Donbass from the Verkhovna Rada’s draft laws, made by its new speaker (famous, as many people say, for his command and control of snipers on Maidan). This is in direct contradiction with what our negotiating partners confirmed earlier today as a firm French position, and what we are told by the Americans, including at the top level.

As for Prime Minister Groysman’s initiative to create a ministry for the antiterrorist operation and the occupied territories, I have read somewhere that something of the kind has already been established. But if the head of government, who, as we have just ascertained, should be implementing the Minsk Agreements, creates a ministry for the occupied territories, he regards these territories not as ones that have agreed to live in a united Ukrainian state, albeit with the proviso that the Minsk Package of Measures is implemented, but as ones subject to being liberated militarily. I hope our Western partners will also pay attention to this philosophy. We wouldn’t like this philosophy to be converted to practical actions, although there are sufficient grounds to fear this.