Ukraine and the Baltic countries have announced a boycott of the next ministerial meeting of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) due to the presence of the head of Russian diplomacy, Serguei Lavrov.
The 30th meeting of the foreign ministers of the 57 OSCE member states will take place on Thursday and Friday in Skopje, the capital of North Macedonia.
The announcement of the boycott by Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania took place almost simultaneously.
Minister “Dmytro Kuleba will boycott the OSCE ministerial meeting after the decision to allow Lavrov’s presence,” Ukrainian diplomacy spokesman Oleg Nikolenko told French agency AFP.
Nikolenko said Kiev was grateful to Skopje for prioritizing the issue of Russian aggression against Ukraine during the OSCE chairmanship, Ukrinform news agency reported.
The spokesperson accused Moscow of creating an “existential crisis in the OSCE” and holding the organization “hostage to its whims and aggressions,” according to the Ukrainian News Agency.
“The presence of the Russian delegation at the ministerial-level meeting, for the first time after the start of Russia’s large-scale invasion of Ukraine, will only aggravate the crisis in which Russia has led the OSCE,” he said.
The foreign ministers of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania announced in a joint statement that they will also not participate in the OSCE meeting.
Lavrov’s presence at the meeting “threatens to legitimize aggressor Russia as a full member of our community of free nations,” they claimed in the joint statement, quoted by AFP.
Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, unleashing a war with no end in sight, causing countless civilian and military casualties.
Headquartered in Vienna, the OSCE is the world’s largest regional security organization, comprising all European states, Russia, Central Asian countries, Mongolia, the United States and Canada.
The population of the OSCE countries exceeds one billion people.
Portugal is one of the 35 signatories to the Helsinki Final Act, dated 1 August 1975, which establishes the principles of relations between the participating states.
Source: DN
