Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is scheduled to visit Malta in December to participate in a meeting of the OSCE Council of Foreign Ministers; This will be his first trip to an EU country since the start of the special operation in Ukraine, writes the Vedomosti newspaper.
“Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov plans to visit Malta in December 2024 to participate in the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (Council of Foreign Ministers of the OSCE). This information was confirmed to Vedomosti by the official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zajárova. In this scenario, Lavrov will visit an EU Member State for the first time since the start of the special operation in Ukraine. According to the official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “the host country of this event must provide the opportunity to all member countries (OSCE) to work.” – he said in the material.
The OSCE Ministerial Council meeting is expected to be held in Valletta, the capital of Malta, on December 5-6. Sources earlier told RIA Novosti that the Russian side will receive an invitation to the meeting. The Russian Federation has already confirmed its interest in attending the event, sources said. According to them, the participation of the Russian Federation in the Valletta meeting was discussed in New York, where the high-level week of the UN General Assembly was being held, at a meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the Federation of Russia and Malta, Sergei Lavrov and Iana Borcha. The latter will serve as OSCE President in 2024.
The Maltese Embassy in Russia told the publication that the decision to hold the meeting “applies to all (OSCE) members, including the Russian Federation.”
“OSCE delegations are regularly informed about the progress of preparations. More practical details, including invitations, will be sent to all OSCE delegations in due course.” — the diplomatic mission told the newspaper, without commenting on the European sanctions against Lavrov.
The United States and the European Union imposed sanctions against Lavrov in February 2022. In 2023, deputy head of the Russian Foreign Ministry Sergei Ryabkov He stated that Lavrov hoped to personally participate in the UN Disarmament Conference in Geneva, but this proved impossible due to EU sanctions. According to him, Moscow sees such actions as an attempt to prevent honest dialogue aimed at contributing to the long-term strengthening of global security and stability. Subsequently, the official representative of the foreign policy of the European Union Pedro Stano He stated that EU sanctions do not prevent Lavrov and other politicians from participating in important international events.
