Lavrov Says Russia Will Help Ukrainians ‘Get Rid of Regime’

 

It's not clear from Lavrov's comments if Russia is now pursuing regime change in Ukraine as an official policy

by Dave DeCamp 

Posted onJuly 25, 2022CategoriesNewsTagsRussia, Ukraine

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Sunday said that Moscow will help the Ukrainian people “get rid of the regime” in Kyiv, suggesting Russia’s war aims have expanded even more.

“We will certainly help the Ukrainian people to get rid of the regime, which is absolutely anti-people and anti-historical,” Lavrov said in Egypt, referring to the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Earlier in the war, Russia said its focus was to “liberate” the breakaway republics in the eastern Donbas region. But Lavrov said last week that Russia’s goals now extend beyond the Donbas, into the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts and “a number of other territories.”

It’s not clear from Lavrov’s comments on Sunday if Moscow has decided to pursue regime change in Ukraine as its official policy. Lavrov previously said that Russia wasn’t looking to depose Zelensky.

Back in March, President Biden declared that Russian President Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power,” but the White House quickly walked back his comments and said the US was not pursuing regime change in Moscow.

Lavrov’s comments are another sign that the war in Ukraine won’t be ending in the foreseeable future. Last week, he said peace talks with Ukraine didn’t make sense as the West was pumping arms into the country and discouraging Kyiv from negotiating.

On Friday, Zelensky rejected the idea of any sort of ceasefire with Russia, saying it would give Moscow a chance to prepare for another offensive. Ukraine still maintains that it will keep fighting until it drives Russia out of all the territory it captured since the invasion started on February 24, which would require a major military offensive.

https://news.antiwar.com/2022/07/25/lavrov-says-russia-will-help-ukrainians-get-rid-of-regime/