The Kremlin has responded to French President Emmanuel Macron's "very, very confrontational" televised remarks the day prior wherein he warned his countrymen that Putin is a threat to the European continent. "If a country can invade its neighbour in Europe and go unpunished, nobody can be sure of anything." That's when he asserted: "Beyond Ukraine, the Russian threat is real - it affects the European countries."
"President Putin is violating our borders to assassinate opponents, manipulate elections," he claimed in the remarks, urging on European allies to "prepare" and even suggesting France could extend its nuclear deterrent over the continent. On Thursday Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has responded by saying, "Any reasonable person would understand that Russia does not want a war with Europe."
Lavrov suggested Macron is saber-rattling just like Hitler and Napoleon did, calling them the French president's "predecessors, who also wanted to fight Russia."
Both historic leaders suffered catastrophic losses and defeats to their armies after sending them into Russia in 1812 and 1941, respectively. The difference is that Hitler and Napoleon "said directly: ‘We must conquer Russia, we must defeat Russia.’ And he [Macron], apparently, wants the same thing, but for some reason says that we must fight Russia so that it does not defeat France; that Russia is creating a threat to France and Europe," Lavrov pointed out.
As for the claims that Moscow will take the fight beyond Europe, and into Ukraine, Lavrov described, "President [Putin has said many times that this is absolute nonsense. I think that any sane person would understand that [by launching its military operation] Russia only wants to eliminate the root causes of the situation created by the West in Ukraine." This is reference to NATO expansion to Russia's doorstep, among other issues.
On the nuclear comments, the Russian top diplomat warned:
"If he considers us a threat, if he is calls a meeting of the chiefs of staff of the [Western] European countries and Britain; if he says that it is necessary to use nuclear weapons; if he prepares to use nuclear weapons against Russia – this is, of course, a threat."
Alongside her boss, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova blasted Macron’s comments as "detached from reality" and contradictory to his prior stance of wanting to see de-escalation.
And separately Putin spokesman Dimitry Peskov told TASS "It seems that France indeed wants the war to continue," adding that: "This is nuclear rhetoric and [France’s] claim toward nuclear leadership in Europe."
No comments:
Post a Comment