Lavrov Plans to Visit Donbass, Meet With Ministry Employees in Lugansk, Donetsk

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said that he plans to visit Donbass and meet with the employees of the ministry’s representative offices in Lugagsk and Donetsk.

"I’m planning to go there. There are representative offices of the Russian Foreign Ministry in Lugansk and Donetsk. They will open in the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions later. I want to go there and talk with the employees of our representative offices," Lavrov said at the Evening With Vladimir Solovyov show on the Rossiya 1 broadcaster.

Russian FM Sergey Lavrov said he is going to visit Donbass pic.twitter.com/pDPlHDbLGM

— Sputnik (@SputnikInt) March 14, 2024

Lavrov on Possible Direct Russia-NATO Clash: Unaware of Their Plans

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that he is unaware of Western plans when commenting on a possibility of a direct confrontation between Russia and NATO.

"I don’t know their plans. But, apparently, they will be act tricky, either like the Germans ‘we will remotely direct deadly weapons against Russian cities’, or they will say that these are just instructors who sit and watch what the Ukrainians are doing," Lavrov added when speaking on the show.

West Aims to Give Zelensky Formula Final Form at Switzerland Meeting

The minister also added that the West seeks to hold a meeting on Ukraine in Switzerland without Russia’s presence and give Zelensky’s so-called peace formula a final form.

"Their idea is to hold another meeting in Switzerland, not to invite us, and to complete the editing of Zelensky’s entire ‘formula’ at this meeting, to give it a final, irrevocable and unchangeable form. Then [they want to] call us and hand it to us, as Zelensky has said. They said that they will hand it over, but it will not be up for negotiations," Lavrov emphasized.

Russia to Take Into Account Lack of EU’s Interest in Meeting With Leadership

Moscow will take into account that there is a lack of interest among ambassadors of the European Union member states in negotiations with the Russian leadership.

"This is a big surprise to me … this is rude. If this is how they feel about the opportunity to communicate with representatives of the Russian leadership, then we, of course, will take into account that they have no interest in this," he underlined.

Earlier in March, Lavrov said that he had invited EU countries' ambassadors for a conversation ahead of the Russian presidential election held later in March, but they failed to follow through just two days before the scheduled meeting.