NATO “obviously lied” by signaling it had not yet decided about letting Ukraine use Western-supplied weapons to hit targets deep inside Russia, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated on Friday. According to her, permission has already been granted and any discussion about it in the West is a “smoke screen.”
Her comments came amid debates in the West about authorization for Kiev to use Western long-range weapons to strike deep inside Russia. Officially, Ukraine is not allowed to attack targets far behind the front line with US-made weapons. However, according to statements made earlier on Friday by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, “several” other members of the US-led military bloc, including the UK, have “never imposed any” such limits on Kiev. According to Zakharova, this largely makes the talk of restrictions moot.
“This is exactly what Russia has been talking about all this time: it was obvious that NATO members were lying and throwing a smoke screen by inventing a story that they had allegedly not yet decided whether or not to allow the Kiev regime to use Western weapons for strikes on Russian territory,” Zakharova stated.
This is a classic NATO-style manipulation.
According to the spokeswoman, the bloc is using the same strategy for peace negotiations.
“They [NATO] are misleading countries they are trying to get to attend the conference in Switzerland by telling fairy tales about its ‘focus on a peaceful settlement’ in much the same way,” she stated, referring to the Ukraine peace summit in Lucerne scheduled for mid-June, to which Russia has not been invited.
Moscow earlier said it would not attend the Swiss conference even if it received an invitation, arguing that it would likely revolve around Vladimir Zelensky’s so-called ‘peace formula’ that envisages the return of all former Ukrainian territories, including Crimea, a complete withdrawal of Russian troops, and an international tribunal for Russian leaders for alleged war crimes.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov earlier called the plan “a figment of a sick imagination,” and said that it resembled an “ultimatum” rather than a formula for peace talks.
Russia has long stressed that it is open to a political solution to the conflict based on mutual consideration of the interests of all countries involved. It has criticized the West for escalating the conflict with weapons supplies to Ukraine and talk of strikes deep inside Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin this week warned that long-range strikes on Russian territory using Western-made weaponry could lead to a “global conflict.”