‘We will act as we need, as it is profitable for us and with a clear mind’: Kremlin and Ministry of Foreign Affairs on situation in Ukraine

Kremlin have calculated different degrees of reaction

The press secretary of the president of Russia, Dmitry Peskov, declared that the Russian delegation will arrive at the site of a new round of negotiations with Ukraine by the evening of March 2. Aide to the President of Russia Vladimir Medinsky will remain the chief negotiator. The Kremlin hopes that the Ukrainian delegation will come to the negotiations, as well as to their success, but they will not make forecasts.

“All conditions necessary to resolve this situation, they have been formulated quite clearly by the president of Russia many times," Peskov stated.

Peskov also spoke about sanctions. According to him, the economy of Russia is now experiencing a serious blow, but there is a margin of safety, “we will land on our feet”.

“Judging by the measures that many countries are taking against us, they are now all de facto unfriendly — whether they are on the list or not. In this case, the list — it's secondary, but the retaliatory measures to these unfriendly, hostile actions — retaliatory measures, of course, should be analysed, no one is going to shoot himself in the foot to spite someone. We will act as we need, as it is profitable for us and with a clear mind," Peskov said.

Peskov noted that the Kremlin have calculated different degrees of reaction from foreign countries to the operation to demilitarise Ukraine — from mildest to toughest.

The Kremlin spokesman said that there are a huge number of nationalist military formations operating in Ukraine, and they must be eliminated.

“They are real neo-Nazis. These are the same people who in 2014 — eight years ago — started just killing their own people, who started shelling, shooting, torturing people in the south-east of Ukraine. Actually, at the very time when the war began, when war crimes began to be committed, then, unfortunately, we did not see such a unity of the West, and no one did. And for some reason, it did not occur to MEPs to stand up in protest against the murders of these people in the south-east of the country. Well, unfortunately, someone has to punish these people (neo-Nazis — editor's note)," RIA Novosti quotes.

He is sure that the DPR and the LPR will invite Yad Vashem representatives after the military actions and show them evidence of the crimes of the Ukrainian regime.

Peskov also said that due to the military special operation in Ukraine, the timing of the announcement of the president's address is “slightly” postponed.

“Ukrainian side is laying for time by the order of the US”

Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov also spoke about the negotiations.

“We are ready for the second round of negotiations, but the Ukrainian side is playing for time by the order of the United States," the minister told al-Jazeera (quoted by RIA Novosti). He also said that Russia is not going to discuss the status of Crimea.

He also touched on the topic of nuclear weapons and said that Russia would not allow Ukraine to have it. In his opinion, if a Third World War had happened, it would have been nuclear and brought a lot of destruction.

Yesterday Sergey Lavrov made a statement at the Conference on Disarmament. Including that it is high time to bring American nuclear weapons home from Europe:

“This [the tragedy in Ukraine] is the result of the connivance of the Western backers of the criminal regime that was formed there after the bloody unconstitutional coup in February 2014, carried out contrary to the guarantees of Germany, Poland and France under the agreement on the settlement of the internal Ukrainian crisis. Even then, the attitude of the putschists to European values became clear. Today, the dangers that the Zelensky regime poses to international countries and international security in general have increased significantly after the authorities who established in Kyiv started dangerous plans related to acquiring their own nuclear weapons. The irresponsible statements made in this regard are not empty bravado. Ukraine still has Soviet nuclear technologies and means of delivering such weapons. We cannot but react to this real danger.”