Russia not to discuss any criteria of lifting Western sanctions

MOSCOW, Jan 12 (PRIME) -- Moscow will not discuss any criteria of lifting Western sanctions, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday following a meeting with his Latvian counterpart Edgars Rinkevics.

“We did not impose any sanctions. We did not launch this sanction spiral, which is now unwinding. We time and time again said that…some our colleagues suggested we coordinate some criteria, and if we fulfill them – sanctions will be lifted. We will discuss nothing on the matter,” Lavrov said.

“These measures are absolutely illegitimate and counterproductive, everyone is suffering from them, including us. But we will most surely solve the situation, and, I think, we will even benefit from it, while our European partners that experience the negative effect from the sanctions must draw their own conclusions. These are their problems. These are not our problems.”

On January 5, French President Francois Hollande said the E.U. must lift sanctions it imposed earlier against Russia if there are signs of progress in the Ukrainian geopolitical crisis. Earlier in January, Bloomberg reported the U.S. is ready to offer Moscow to ease some of the sanctions that Washington imposed in exchange for some trade-offs in Ukraine.

In July, the E.U. and the U.S. imposed sectorial sanctions on the Russian economy, and in retaliation Moscow restricted food imports from the E.U., the U.S., Canada, Australia and Norway.

End