Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has provoked laughter after
referring to the invasion of Ukraine as "the war which was launched
against us" during the G20 diplomatic forum in India.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claims US hypocrisy.

"The war, which we are trying to stop, which was launched against
us, using....." he said as the crowd's laughter cut him off.



University of Chicago professor Konstantin Sonin  said today:  "This is
hilarious.   And embarrassing.  Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Lavrov
says "the war we are trying to stop was launched against us" and the
Indian audience—supposedly sympathetic—audibly laughs. Russian
"diplomats" think that the lies they use to feed Putin's fantasies.

—I'm guessing Lavrov's next holiday could well be in Siberia. I'd hope he
   doesn't  have an intolerance for salt.

MeisterEckhart wrote on Mar 4^th, 2023 at 10:51am:


Putin is on the hook for a lot, but is it also fair enough to say the west (USA) conducted itself in a way that 100% ensured Putin would follow he course he did?

freediver wrote on Mar 4^th, 2023 at 11:25am:


I wouldn't say all, 60/40?

MeisterEckhart wrote on Mar 4^th, 2023 at 10:51am:
 

In which you are complicit: see the UN definition of "defensive war" (Chapter VII, article 51":

“Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security. Measures taken by Members in the exercise of this right of self-defence shall be immediately reported to the Security Council and shall not in any way affect the authority and responsibility of the Security Council under the present Charter to take at any time such action as it deems necessary in order to maintain or restore international peace and security.”


..."until the Security Council...."; the SC itself is rendered ineffective by the disastrous veto power claimed by all 5 members.

Re the present Ukraine war:

"Successive Ukrainian governments in the 2000s sought a closer relationship with the European Union (EU).[44][45] The government of president Viktor Yanukovych had been negotiating an association agreement with the European Union since 2012.[46] Such a comprehensive trade agreement with the EU would have impacted Ukraine's trade agreements with Russia, the latter being Ukraine's biggest trade partner at the time.[47] Yanukovych believed that the complications could be addressed, and he said that he intended to enter the agreement,[48] but continued to postpone.[49] This was interpreted as an attempt to back out of signing this agreement, and led to a wave of protests which came to be known as the "Euromaidan" movement.[50]

.....Yanukovych was widely disliked in Ukraine's west but had some support in the east, where his native Russian is much more spoken, and in the south. The rallies were initially peaceful but became violent in January 2014 after parliament, dominated by Yanukovych's supporters, passed laws intended to repress the protests. The European Union and the United States urged Yanukovych to negotiate a peaceful end to the conflict and said they would impose sanctions on government officials if they were found responsible for violence."

So the US was already threatening sanctions, if the violence was started by the pro-Russian faction, but not by the pro-NATO faction,  without knowing the facts.

The rest is history; perceived self interest on all sides resulting in war.

OK....and you still insist 'national sovereignty' should take precedence over international law.....

Quote:


ie, his claim of "defensive war".......like I said it's in the eye of the beholder, only international law (eg via ICJ) can determine such matters, given that self-interested individuals always have their own idea of who is the aggressor, in a dispute over territory or governance. 

eg, the IRA opposed to the British military in Northern Ireland; the Arabs opposed to the partition of Palestine, and the swallowing up of majority Russian speaking areas in Ukraine into Ukraine, opposed by Putin, etc etc.

Oh...and the losers of the Chinese civil war whom the US is determined to defend, despite the fact half the US population itself is living paycheck to paycheck, such is the economic dysfunction in the US (based on natural private sector greed, of course).   

The Russian Federation has no credibility.
End of story. 

Gordon wrote on Mar 4^th, 2023 at 11:06am:

No, this war was always going to happen.

Ukrainians made a fateful decision when they decided to cast their lot with western political governance models and western values, as they indicated that they would be exiting the Russian cultural and political sphere of influence.

That's when it became, for Russians, not just an insult but a perceived existential threat.

It's what Putin and Lavrov really mean when they say Ukraine started it.

MeisterEckhart wrote on Mar 4^th, 2023 at 12:09pm:


So Ukraine is to Russia what Vietnam was to the US?