Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba will boycott the OSCE ministerial meeting because of the decision to allow Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to attend. This was stated by Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleh Nikolenko, reports UNN.
The Ukrainian delegation will not participate in the OSCE ministerial meeting at the level of the foreign minister. (...) The presence of the Russian delegation at the ministerial meeting for the first time since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine will only exacerbate the crisis into which Russia has driven the OSCE,
Details
According to him, the meeting of the OSCE Foreign Affairs Council will be held on November 30-December 1 in the city of Skopje.
He noted that Ukraine highly appreciates the efforts of North Macedonia as the 2023 chairmanship and personally of Foreign Minister Buyar Osmani, who have demonstrated high professionalism and unwavering commitment to protecting the OSCE principles and commitments.
"We are particularly grateful to North Macedonia for prioritizing the issue of countering Russian aggression against Ukraine during its chairmanship," Nikolenko said.
At the same time, the Foreign Ministry emphasized that Russia is consistently destroying the OSCE by abusing the consensus rule.
"Resorting to blackmail and open threats, Russia has systematically blocked consensus on key issues. The blocking of Estonia's candidacy for the OSCE chairmanship in 2024 was also arbitrary. In addition, Russia has illegally detained three Ukrainians - OSCE representatives, who have been in prison for more than 500 days. Russia has created an existential crisis in the OSCE and turned the organization into a hostage to its whims and aggression," Nikolenko wrote.
Nikolenko noted that "we need to work together to save the OSCE from Russia, not to send signals about the possibility of returning to the forms of cooperation that existed before February 2022 to the state that has unleashed the largest armed aggression in Europe since the end of the Second World War and grossly violated all the principles of the Helsinki Final Act."
"In view of this, the delegation of Ukraine will not participate in the OSCE Ministerial meeting at the level of the Minister for Foreign Affairs. At the same time, Ukraine remains committed to the principles of the OSCE and is ready to continue working with partners to restore respect for the Helsinki Final Act, in particular through the implementation of the Peace Formula of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy," Nikolenko said.
Addendum
Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov said, according to rosSIA, that the Russian delegation would take part in the OSCE meeting in Skopje if Bulgaria opens its airspace for the Russian delegation to fly.
Later it became known that Bulgaria opened its airspace for Lavrov's visit to the OSCE meeting.