The “cold war” between Moscow and the West risks becoming “hot”, believes the head of Russian diplomacy, Sergei Lavrov

Speaking at a meeting of OSCE countries in Malta, Vladimir Putin's foreign minister blasted the role of the United States and the EU in escalating diplomatic tensions across the world.

He had not set foot in the EU since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov arrived at a summit of the Organization on Thursday, December 5 for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Malta, in which his Ukrainian counterpart, Andriï Sybiga, also participates. Faced with representatives of the organization's 57 member countries, a majority of whom denounced Moscow's offensive, the head of Russian diplomacy accused the West of having orchestrated a “new cold war”.

“In order to put NATO back on the political scene, (…) a unifying enemy was needed. The solution was a reincarnation of the Cold War, except that now the risk is much greater of moving to a hot phase”he said, according to comments transcribed by the Russian press agency Ria Novosti.

Castigating the American administration in power, accused of “advancing NATO infrastructure in the Asia-Pacific region”, Sergei Lavrov was moved by the fact that “military exercises are increasing” in the region. “This is clearly an attempt to destabilize the entire Eurasian continent“, he said.

In response, the head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, accused his Russian counterpart of being “very good at drowning listeners in a tsunami of misinformation.”