MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov blamed the European Union on Monday for deteriorating relations with Russia and accused the bloc of systematically destroying cooperation mechanisms.
Ties between Russia and the West, already at post-Cold War lows, are under renewed pressure on the fate of the Kremlin critic, Alexei Navalny, whose arrest and treatment by Moscow has raised the prospect of further sanctions on Russia.
Last week, Lavrov said Moscow would be ready to break ties with the European Union if the bloc struck it with painful economic sanctions, a statement that Germany described as bewildering and incomprehensible.
In talks with the Finnish Foreign Minister on Monday, Lavrov blamed the poor state of relations in Brussels.
“Relations have been constantly torn apart by the European Union,” said Lavrov, quoted by the RIA news agency. “The carcass of those relations was consciously destroyed at the initiative of Brussels.”
Pressure for sanctions has grown since Russia angered European countries this month by expelling German, Polish and Swedish diplomats without informing the EU’s foreign policy chief, who was in Moscow for a visit at the time.
Lavrov said on Monday: “The EU has consistently destroyed all mechanisms, without exception.”
However, he said, this does not mean that Russia withdraws from its relations with individual member states.
“Don’t confuse Europe with the European Union. When it comes to Europe, we’re not going anywhere,” said Lavrov. “We have many friends in Europe.”
(Reporting by Polina Ivanova and Tom Balmforth; Editing by Peter Graff)