Russia believes it is possible and necessary to prevent any armed confrontation between nuclear powers while the United States and NATO are risking such a conflict as they are escalating hostilities in Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said.
"In the context of the Ukraine conflict, the big danger is that leading the matter to escalation, the United States and NATO countries risk ending up in a situation of direct armed clash of nuclear powers. We believe that such a development of events should and can be prevented," Lavrov told the International Affairs magazine.
Russia is forced to remind the West about military and political risks as it believes that a nuclear war will have no winners, the top diplomat said. Lavrov recalled that the Nuclear Five states have confirmed that nuclear war should never be unleashed in their joint statement on January 3, 2022.
"Under the current conditions, the document has additional relevance — from its logic, it follows that it is necessary to prevent any military confrontation between nuclear powers since there is a risk that it can transition to the nuclear level. In this regard, at this stage, the most important task is for each of the nuclear states to remain committed to these understandings and to show maximum restraint," Lavrov said.
For Russia, the possession of nuclear weapons today is the only answer to some of the threats the country faces, according to the minister.
"In the context of deterrence, the possession of nuclear weapons is currently the only possible response to some significant external threats to the security of our country. The development of the situation around Ukraine has confirmed the validity of our concerns in this area," Lavrov said.
NATO has grossly violated the principle of the indivisibility of security as it proclaimed itself a nuclear alliance and is aiming to achieve Russia’s "strategic defeat," the minister added. The West then used Russia’s response as a pretext to move to a fierce confrontation with Moscow using a hybrid arsenal of means, according to Lavrov.