Russia’s Lavrov to travel to OSCE talks in Malta despite EU sanctions

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is to travel to Malta for a foreign ministers’ meeting of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), despite EU sanctions on him, the Vedomosti business daily reported on Friday.

The report cited Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

The trip would be the first by Lavrov to an EU country since the European Union imposed sanctions on him and President Vladimir Putin in February 2022 immediately after the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The talks, the 31st ministerial council of the OSCE, are to be held in Malta on December 5 and 6. They are being hosted by Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ian Borg.

Lavrov was last in an EU country in December 2021, also at an OSCE meeting.

When the OSCE met in Łódź in Poland in December 2022, Warsaw refused Lavrov entry, even though the EU sanctions do not stipulate this.

While Moscow has withdrawn from a number of other European institutions, it has remained in the OSCE, seeing it as a platform for communicating its position on the war.

In a newspaper interview, Lavrov criticized Turkey for its arms deliveries to Ukraine, saying they were killing Russian soldiers and civilians.