At the G20 foreign ministers’ meeting held alongside theUnited Nations General Assemblyin New York on September 25,Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrovescalated Moscow’s rhetoric by accusing the US-ledNATOalliance and theEuropean Unionof having “already declared a real war on my country and [being] directly involved in it” through military and political support for Ukraine.
Lavrov asserted that the West has moved beyond indirect involvement and is now participating directly in the conflict, repeating the Kremlin’s long-standing claim that Western support for Kyiv constitutes de facto war. He blamed the “collective West” for provoking the Ukraine crisis, describing it as a manifestation of “neocolonial ambitions” that fuel global instability and multiply regional conflicts.
The foreign minister also linked the escalation in Ukraine to other global conflicts, citing the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza and ongoing crises in Africa as symptoms of what he described as the West’s failure to adhere to the United Nations Charter.
Sergey Viktorovich Lavrov, born on March 21, 1950, in Moscow, is Russia’s Foreign Minister since 2004 and the country’s longest-serving top diplomat since the Soviet era. Son of an Armenian father and a Russian mother, Lavrov grew up primarily with his mother in the Moscow region. He graduated with a silver medal from Moscow school No. 607, known for advanced English language studies.
Separately, Russia’s ambassador to France, Alexey Meshkov, issued a stark warning in a radio interview with RTL, saying that if NATO were to shoot down Russian military aircraft–alleged to be violating alliance airspace–that act would be considered war. “There would be war. What else could there be?” Meshkov declared. His remarks came in response to comments from US President Donald Trump, who said “Yes, I do” when asked if NATO members should shoot down Russian jets if they breached their airspace.
Meshkov emphasized that although “quite a few planes violate our airspace, accidentally and not accidentally… no one shoots them down,” portraying Russia as exercising restraint. He also accused European governments of failing to provide “any material evidence” of Russia’s alleged involvement in recent drone incidents.
These warnings came against a backdrop of increased tensions after Estonia invoked NATO’s Article 4 consultations on September 19, following its claim that three Russian MiG-31 fighter jets entered Estonian airspace for roughly 12 minutes. Russia’s Defense Ministry denied the accusation, insisting its flights were routine and fully compliant with international airspace regulations . Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov likewise dismissed the allegations as baseless.
Lavrov’s and Meshkov’s statements mark a hardening of Russia’s rhetoric amid growing NATO-Russia confrontations. The Kremlin’s message is clear: any NATO attack on Russian combat jets risks triggering a direct war, while Western powers are accused of provoking and participating in a broader conflict that Moscow says threatens global stability.
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