Russia's response to the new Western sanctions, should there be any, will be reciprocal in line with the international relations standards, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Saturday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 12th September, 2020) Russia's response to the new Western sanctions, should there be any, will be reciprocal in line with the international relations standards, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Saturday.
The poisoning of Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny in late August prompted a few officials in Europe and other Western countries to call for sanctioning Russia over it, although Moscow's role has in no way been substantiated or even clearly stated. The discourse focused specifically on the calls to halt the Nord Stream 2 project, a massive offshore pipeline designed to pump Russian gas directly to Germany, currently in the final phase of construction.
"The principle of reciprocity is still in effect in international affairs. Let us see what the new sanctions are going to be," Lavrov told Russia's Rossiya 1 television channel, adding "We, of course, will respond. This should not be left without a response."
Since 2014, the West has exerted political and economic pressure on Moscow over the alleged involvement in the Ukrainian conflict and the referendum in Crimea that resulted in the peninsula's reunification with Russia. The European Union and a number of third countries, including the United States, Canada and Australia, have since imposed several rounds of sanctions on Russia's trade, energy, banking and defense sectors.
Moscow has denied the allegations and taken countermeasures, with the most well-known being the adoption of a state policy favoring the domestic production over imports. Numerous European producers, especially small agricultural businesses, have decried the loss of opportunity to export produce to the Russian market and urged their respective governments to lift the restrictions.
