Russian Foreign Ministry source responds to reports Ukraine talks rejected – Interfax

(Interfax – March 8, 2014) Ukraine did not ask Russia to hold a meeting in Paris at the level of foreign ministers, while when planning contacts in Paris between Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Western counterparts nothing was said about expanding the number of participants, a Russian Foreign Ministry source has said.

“When planning contacts between the Russian minister and his counterparts from the US and the EU in Paris (on 5 March – Interfax), it was never said that the circle of participants should be widened,” the source told Interfax on Saturday [8 March].

According to the source, Lavrov’s meeting with US Secretary of State John Kerry was initially coordinated at the residence of the Russian ambassador in France, “which is where it was held”, while a multilateral meeting involving the foreign ministers of Russia, the US, Germany, France, Britain and EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Catherine Ashton was held at the French Foreign Ministry.

“As soon as it began, the Americans asked the Russian delegation whether it would mind if Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchytsya, who ‘happened to be in the same building one floor above’, were to join the team. Clearly, this ‘piano in the bushes’ [reference to a situation that is as if impromptu but pre-planned] does not really fit in with diplomatic practice,” the source said.

At the same time, the source said, “neither Deshchytsya, who flew in to Paris from Kiev on John Kerry’s plane, nor other Ukrainian diplomats asked us for a meeting between the Russian and Ukrainian ministers”.

“It means that they are relying exclusively on their mentors [“povodyri”], as has been the case right from the start of Maydan, and expect us to consent to contacts with Kiev solely in accordance with the Western scenario,” the Russian Foreign Ministry source said.

On 5 March, Lavrov visited Paris, where he had meetings with the foreign ministers of the United States, Germany, France, the UK and the EU. Some Russian media have claimed that on 5 March in Paris, the Russian delegation headed by Sergey Lavrov refused to enter into negotiations with Deshchytsya.