On the 61st PABSEC Summit and General Assembly

(from the briefing by Russian Foreign Ministry
Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, May 10, 2023)

During the May 4, 2023, Plenary Session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (PABSEC) General Assembly, the Ukrainian delegation has reached a new low in its savage behaviour. To stop the head of Russia’s parliamentary delegation, State Duma MP Olga Timofeyeva, from delivering her remarks, the Ukrainian MPs – this is what they call themselves, at least – tried to unfurl the flag, banner and symbols of the Right Sector, an extremist organisation, behind her. They accompanied this with aggressive chants and tried to provoke the Russian delegation into openly confronting them.

Do you think this is the first time this has happened? To anyone arguing that “you know, the special military operation has hit a raw nerve to this extent,” this is not true. What about those in the Ukrainian delegation who followed Russian journalists in the corridors of PACE with their wild chants and threats? We have footage to prove this. Do you think that it started in 2022? Not at all. This has happened before. What about the would-be delegates from Kiev who ran around the UN Headquarters in New York following the Information and Press Department’s Deputy Director chanting nationalist slogans? Moreover, these very would-be Ukrainian delegates to the UN wore camouflage, made threats, screamed and said that they knew all the personal data and that “retribution is imminent.” Incidents of this kind have become all too common and occurred regularly. What about the Mirotvorets website? Did it start operating after 2022? It has been there for many years now. It was the collective West which sponsored, subsidised it and offered tech support without criticising, let alone condemning it in any way, not a single time – never. The West kept saying: Go ahead, you’re on the right track. Good job. Just say that this is about freedom of expression and openness, and everything will be alright. They have been nurturing this organised crime group for many years.

This provocation is a telling example of how detached from reality the nationalist gang tasked with ruling Ukraine has become. It shows that it does not understand where it is and what it does. Just look at the President of Ukraine in his green trousers and a sweatshirt touring all kinds of film festivals, musical contests and saying all this nonsense. Meanwhile, his delegates stage all sorts of performances at diplomatic venues, and all this is what Zelensky calls “an insolent foreign policy.” I did not make this up. He was the one who said Ukraine must be insolent in its foreign policy. This was perhaps a new word in international relations coming from the Kiev regime, even if it happened to be an obscenity.

I have to say that among other things this was a show of total disrespect towards Türkiye as the event’s chair, as well as towards the PABSEC MPs who were taking part. When the host invites delegations to attend an event, it undertakes to ensure the safety and security of the proceedings. But then someone decided to derail them without any ideological grounds or because they could not come to a consensus on a given issue, during negotiations or a debate, but just for the sake of expressing themselves in this sordid manner. Of course, this greatly undermines the reputation of the host and all those in charge of holding this event in general.

Displaying the flag of the Right Sector, a terrorist organisation, was especially cynical. I will not elaborate on why the Right Sector is no good and why its flags should not be displayed anywhere. What matters here is that it happened just a few days after the May 2, 2014, Odessa tragedy anniversary, when activists from this very organisation burned alive and killed several dozens of their own fellow Ukrainians, those people of Ukraine, Ukrainian nationals, whom the Kiev regime pretends to care about so much.

We firmly condemn the actions committed by these people calling themselves the Ukrainian delegation. The overwhelming majority in the international community shares this approach – I mean the refusal to accept these actions and their condemnation.

As for the proceedings of the 61st PABSEC General Assembly, we regret to note the gradual degradation of this platform which has offered the Kiev regime a podium for expressing itself and professing its anti-Russia rhetoric with the tacit connivance of several member states.

Our decision in December 2022 to suspend the payments of Russia’s assessed contributions to the budget of this structure was a logical way to respond to the hostile actions by certain participants to infringe upon the rights and interests of the Russian delegation to PABSEC. In these circumstances, we do not see any possibility of revising this decision, at least until the puppet Kiev regime stops undermining with impunity constructive multilateral cooperation among sovereign Black Sea countries.