Sergey Lavrov: “In this year of the 80th anniversary of the Great Victory and the 80th anniversary of the UN, and ahead of the events scheduled to mark the 80th anniversaries of the Yalta and Potsdam conferences, it would be reasonable to outline our stance for the immutability of the system of international law as the basis of the post-war world order formulated as the goals and principles of the UN Charter”

Photo: MFA

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks at a General Meeting of the Russian International Affairs Council, Moscow, January 30, 2025.

Mr Ivanov,

Colleagues, friends,

It is gratifying to convene once more for the General Meeting within the walls of this mansion on Spiridonovka Street, where all our pre-pandemic meetings were planned and held.

Our last gathering (a sobering thought) took place in December 2020. Amid the pandemic, we met via videoconference to discuss the profound challenges – specifically, the COVID-19 pandemic – confronting humanity.

By historical standards, the intervening period – a mere four years – is negligible, “a spark in the historical bonfire.” Yet, the significance of this segment of history between our December 2020 assembly and today’s meeting is immense, both for our foreign policy and international relations. Its importance cannot be overstated.

For three years now, the special military operation has persisted. Our servicemen endure arduous combat to rescue the people of Donbass and Novorossiya, to safeguard our nation’s interests, security, sovereignty, and future. Undoubtedly, the special military operation has clarified much. As the saying goes, it “has torn off the masks” from those who once posed as partners, feigning allegiance to democratic and liberal ideals. I will not dwell on this, but the fact remains.

Many of you, as we observe, actively engage in informational efforts across television channels and social networks. The overwhelming majority of our analysts concur that we confront Western hybrid aggression – and, in certain respects, non-hybrid, direct aggression. President Vladimir Putin addressed this when highlighting the unavoidable military-technical implications of supplying Ukraine with long-range weaponry to strike targets (including civilian ones) on the Russian territory. Yet, we face aggression across all domains: military, political, financial and economic, information and psychological, and – I might add – analytical and prognostic, the latter having a direct bearing on the Russian International Affairs Council as well as other political analysis bodies.

The balance of forces on the global stage – as many of you note in addresses to domestic and foreign audiences – is undergoing radical transformation. Indeed, it has already fundamentally shifted. The hegemonic ambitions of the collective West, orchestrated (to put it plainly) by Washington under the previous administration, are evident to all. Under the current US leadership, this orchestration will likely grow more cohesive. It targets not only us but also China, Iran, the DPRK, and virtually any nation pursuing an independent, sovereign policy rooted in its core interests.

Today’s geopolitical divide lies not between the West and Russia, but between a Western minority and the Global Majority. A growing number of states – large, medium, and small – are energising the formation of a multipolar world, advancing self-reliant, nationally oriented policies. Regional organisations, such as the EAEU, CSTO, CIS, SCO, Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf, LAS, ASEAN, African Union, and CELAC, are amplifying their potential. Horizontal inter-civilisational ties between these structures are gaining significance.

BRICS serves as the aggregator of these regional processes fostering consciousness as a global organisation many aspire to join; it is expanding both through membership growth as well as the establishment of a new partner nation category, which now encompasses a dozen states. The “queue” persists unabated. The expansion of BRICS following the Kazan Summit underscores the principal trajectory of global development – namely, the rising assertiveness of their role by major states across Eurasia, Africa, and Latin America.

These shifts are undeniable. Only deeply biased observers – of whom, regrettably, there are many, particularly abroad – could overlook them. Such perspectives exist domestically too; we must acknowledge them as a given and diligently craft counterarguments.

President Putin regularly offers an analysis of current trends in international affairs in his statements. These assessments have been set out in the updated Concept of the Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation, which provides guidelines for the operation of our diplomatic service. As Igor Ivanov has pointed out just now, the mission of the Russian International Affairs Council is to promote the implementation of our foreign policy, which means that the concept goes beyond the scope of a purely state policy.

I would like to draw your attention to an important subject that has to do with attempts to call into question the world order that is based on the results of the Second World War and our Victory in the Great Patriotic War. The first such attempts were made long before the special military operation. The West is doing this under the pretext of promoting an order based on rules. It is a direct antithesis to the principles set in the UN Charter, primarily the principle of the sovereign equality of states. The United States and its allies have not been guided by the key principle of the UN Charter, which states that the UN is based on the sovereign equality of states, in any conflict or international situation that developed after WWII and the establishment of the UN.

Take a look at the world’s post-war history and its most salient and dramatic elements. The West never respected that principle. After coming into office, the Trump administration has seemingly distanced itself from the liberal world order through its Secretary of State, Marco Rubio. However, it has also announced that it will create a new world order out of chaos, focusing on the “America First” principle. The difference is only in the terms they use.

It should be said, for fairness’ sake, that doubts about the viability of the UN-centric system have not only been raised by Western politicians but also by the expert community, including some members of the academic community, experts and political analysts in Russia.

I can understand it when they say that the Yalta-Potsdam world has collapsed and we should replace it with something new. You do not have to be an expert to see the drawbacks and shortcomings in the operation of the UN and related institutions. I believe that you will agree that the root causes of this are not that the principles of interstate interaction, on which the UN stands, are fallacious or obsolete, but rather the inability of certain states, primarily in the West, to apply these principles in their practical politics. I have provided an example just now.

They do not want to apply the principles of the UN Charter, and even when they do apply them, they do so selectively, for example, the principle of the self-determination of nations for Kosovo, and only the principle of territorial integrity for Crimea. If we are honest, the principles of the UN Charter must be applied in their entirety and interconnection, and as a whole.

In this year of the 80th anniversary of the Great Victory and the 80th anniversary of the UN, and ahead of the events scheduled to mark the 80th anniversaries of the Yalta and Potsdam conferences, it would be reasonable to outline our stance for the immutability of the system of international law as the basis of the post-war world order formulated as the goals and principles of the UN Charter.

I firmly believe that this system of international law fully suits the principles of justice and the requirements of the current era of the rising multipolar world, where justice, a sense of justice and respect for all members of the international community are becoming increasingly important. These are the principles of the sovereign equality of states, non-interference in their internal affairs, respect of the rights of all individuals regardless of race, gender, language and religion, as well as all other fundamental principles, including the connection between the principle of territorial integrity and the right of nations to self-determination. That connection is enshrined in the 1970 Declaration on Principles of International Law, which was unanimously adopted at the UN General Assembly. It unambiguously states the principle of respect for the territorial integrity of all states whose governments respect the principle of self-determination and therefore represent the whole people belonging to that territory.

If this formula is applied to the Kiev regime, everything will become clear for anyone who respects international law. If the Yalta-Potsdam world order represented by the UN Charter is dismantled, this would be a large step back. In the current situation, humanity will never be able to adopt a fairer document by consensus. There is no doubt about that.

It is another matter that its practical implementation comes against hegemonistic and egoistical aspirations, primarily of the United States, the Anglo-Saxons and their allies. It is a fact, and the way things are. Once again, it is not the principles, which are just, that we should fight against but those who violate them.

Preserving historical truth is of paramount importance, especially during the year when we will be marking the 80th anniversary of the Great Victory. This is not only about interpreting the past – in fact, it is an integral part of current international politics. We all realise this.

I urge you to focus as much as you can on raising public awareness of this issue. One of President Vladimir Putin’s instructions calls for recognising the crimes prosecuted by the Nuremberg trials as genocide of the peoples of the Soviet Union. It is imperative to give an intellectual rebuff to the revisionist narrative promoted by the West seeking to hush up, or even edit out the decisive contribution that the Red Army made to defeating Nazi Germany, and bury in oblivion the multi-million losses suffered by the peoples of the Soviet Union as a result of Hitler’s aggression. We see such heinous attempts on a daily basis. There have been plenty of them in recent weeks.

I believe that the RIAC leadership and members could focus on initiatives to promote deeper understanding of this subject and related issues in the context of adapting the Council’s analytical and information activities to the new geopolitical reality. The process is already underway, but more needs to be done.

Among other things, this includes information support for the flagship initiatives to create the Greater Eurasian Partnership, build an architecture of continental Eurasian security, combat modern neocolonial practices, and develop new models of international cooperation and coexistence among states. These issues have been consistently brought to the forefront of our foreign policy in recent years. We need expert support for these initiatives.

It is gratifying that the RIAC plans for the current year generally align with our priorities and focus on supporting the objectives included in Russia’s Foreign Policy Concept.

The Council’s plans envision an analysis of the modern system of international relations. It is important to take a closer look at the pros and cons of various aspects of the multipolar system, as well as the risks they run. At the same time, understanding objective trends is essential for guiding our efforts and driving our decisions on Russia’s practical steps in the international arena, and perhaps not only in the international arena, but in domestic affairs as well.

We assume that all research on the RIAC platform is carried out from the national interests’ perspective, with the aim of developing practical recommendations for promoting them effectively. It is important for the RIAC to gain more visible and tangible presence in the Russian media landscape, which often becomes the scene of heated debate – in the context of the special military operation, and not only – on Russia’s place in an increasingly competitive world, on who our allies are, who we should form alliances with in the current situation, and who we should rather distance ourselves from.

I believe that these debates are gaining special weight in our expert community and are just what state institutions need at this turning point in human history.

In this regard, I would like to highlight RIAC’s policy of expanding expert cooperation with the countries of the Global Majority, primarily with China, India, other countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America, as well as think tanks in the Global South and East. Systematic work with them is in demand.

States with unfriendly governments, primarily the Anglo-Saxons, largely continue to have the initiative in propagating analytical content and narratives. Our partners in the Global Majority countries, who are being targeted by aggressive propaganda, are in need of alternative points of view as they seek to form their own idea of what is happening in the world.

Like many of those present here, I attend various political science forums in China, the UAE, Qatar and India. Even there, our representatives cannot prevail at this stage. We are merely “represented” for the sake of formal inclusivity, to show that all the key powers are there. Even the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi is entirely dominated by the Western agenda. It is also financed by Western sponsors.

There is much to talk about here. We have just discussed RIAC’s financial situation with Igor Ivanov during the Board of Trustees meeting. He can share his troubles and worries in an informal setting later. Probably, many of our colleagues present in this room have informal channels of influence on the financial security of our expert community. This is an important matter.

I have learned at first hand that the majority of conferences in friendly countries follow the Western discourses and narratives. We see a large scope of work in this regard, including on contentious and sensitive issues that are brought up at those platforms but are used by the West to drive wedges into our relations with the Global South and East countries.  

A struggle is on for the hearts and the minds. This is one of the visible signs of the current stage in the development of international relations. Those securing for themselves an edge in the sphere of ideas and meanings will go a long way to strengthen their international positions in practical affairs. We have much potential in this regard because the majority of members of the international community share our ideas and narratives (I am saying this with authority), although far from all of them dare to say so out loud (or even in a low voice).  

We are strong enough to lead, eventually, the Global Majority. We have a fantastic scientific, academic, and analytical potential. We share with the Global Majority a common vision of the desired future. This is absolutely certain. Jointly with our ideological allies, primarily those from the SCO and BRICS, we are shaping a new agenda for international cooperation. Despite the West’s numerical superiority, it is unable to stop the process whereby this new agenda is taking shape, an agenda cleansed of all survivals of hegemonism and heeding the interests of all states as required by the UN Charter that I quoted before.  

Russian experts both at the RIAC and other political science organisations are fully prepared to assume the role (and are bracing up to do that) as generators of fresh arguments for the information and explanatory work, ideas and concepts.

It is particularly important at the current life-changing stage in the history of Russia that both diplomats and scientists and everyone in their respective positions should prioritise the national interests, along with the objective to enable our country to take its well-deserved and rightful place in the emerging world order. In the present-day situation, Russia has a chance to become firmly established on the path of sovereign development. President of Russia Vladimir Putin repeatedly said as much.  

In particular, I remember his assessments at the Valdai Forum, where he said that the things would never be what they were in February 2022. This is an important statement.  We were hoping that the West would come to its senses until the last moment and that certain agreements would be reached after all as distinct from all previous attempts to establish a fair and equitable dialogue on strategic stability and on respecting each other’s security interests.  But they rejected all attempts, starting from our 2008 Draft European Security Treaty and up to December 2021, when agreements on strategic stability and respect for mutual security with clear-cut guarantees were proposed to NATO and the United States. In effect, it was suggested that we take what had been repeatedly declared by the OSCE (indivisible security and that no one would lay claim to dominance in Europe and the Euro-Atlantic area) and codify this language that was approved by all OSCE member states at the highest level. They turned us down. 

February 2022 was when the final disappointment and the awareness that the West would never in the foreseeable future accept fair agreements took hold. It was then that the difficult decision was taken, considering the lack of any other alternative, to defend our interests and those of the Russians on the lands that had been founded and developed by Russians but turned up, by a quirk of history, as part of the territory owned by Ukraine that, in turn, was seized by the Nazis. We had no other choice than to ensure our own security and the fate of people over there by launching the special military operation.  

In conclusion, I would like to say that we are interested in upgrading our cooperation with the RIAC and other political science centres, with which our Ministry has always been in close contact. In this regard, we are motivated by the current circumstances and the pivotal nature of the present historical juncture. We are open to joint creative work for the benefit of our country.

Profiting by this occasion, I would like to congratulate you all on past holidays and wish everyone good health and prosperity. I also wish that all of us win Victory. We know how to win wars. We have repeatedly proved this. Today, as never before, it is essential to win peace.

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