Touching upon the situation in Ukraine in an interview with Al-Jazeera, he noted that Moscow is preparing for the second round of talks with Kiev, but that the Ukrainian side is dragging its feet at the behest of Washington.
"We are ready for the second round of the negotiations, but the Ukrainian side is playing for time on the US' orders", Lavrov pointed out.
He spoke after Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that the Russian delegation will wait for the Ukrainian negotiators at the site of the talks late in the evening on Wednesday.
Peskov earlier confirmed that presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky remains the main Russian negotiator in Russia's talks with Ukraine.
The statement followed Russian and Ukrainian officials wrapping up the first round of talks in the Gomel region of Belarus on Monday. The talks are aimed at finding a way to end the Ukraine conflict.
Medinsky told reporters that during the negotiations, the sides managed to find "some common points on which we predict common positions can be found". He said that the sides had agreed on the second round of negotiations, due in Belarus later this week.
He was echoed by Leonid Slutsky, a member of the Russian delegation and the head of the Duma's Committee on Foreign Affairs, who stressed that the sides had found "a number of important points on which progress can be reached".
"The Ukrainian delegation was ready to listen and participate in the most detailed discussion of the essence of the issues on today's agenda. The main result is that the negotiations themselves took place, that the parties heard each other," Slutsky added.
Russia’s special operation in Ukraine was launched with the aim of disarming the current regime in Kiev and preventing it from obtaining nuclear weapons, Lavrov said in an interview with Al-Jazeera.
"The military operation in Ukraine, including Kiev, is aimed at disarming Ukraine. Russia will not let Ukraine obtain nuclear weapons," he added.
Earlier, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky told the Munich Security Conference that Kiev might revise its obligations under the Budapest Memorandum, by which Ukraine had agreed to give away nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees.
Russia was ready for sanctions that were imposed against it but was surprised that the penalties affected athletes and journalists, Lavrov stated.
"We were ready for sanctions but did not expect that they would affect athletes, intellectuals, actors, and journalists," he continued.
On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin in response to the appeal of the leaders of the republics of Donbass, decided to conduct a special military operation. The Russian leader stressed that Moscow’s plans do not include the occupation of Ukrainian territories. After that, the US, EU, and UK, as well as several other states announced that they were imposing sanctions against Russian individuals and legal entities.
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