Former Russian president accuses West of lying, says there can be no business with Anglo-Saxon world

New Delhi: In scathing remarks against the West, former Russian president and deputy chair of the national Security Council Dmitry Medvedev on Sunday said that 2022 shattered illusions about the Western powers and proved that their promises and principles cannot be taken at face value.

In a keynote article in Russia Today, Medvedev - considered close to Russian President Vladimir Putin - accused the West of lying, causing a rift that will remain for decades to come, and convincing Moscow that there is no sense in trying to reach an agreement with them.

“Alas, there is nobody in the West we could deal with about anything for any reason,” he wrote in the article.

Further, Medvedev argued that countries claiming to be leaders in the world had misled Russia by asserting that the threat posed by NATO expansion in Europe was nonexistent.

“They again lied when they backed a peace roadmap for Ukraine, which in reality was meant to give Kiev time to prepare for an eventual armed conflict with Russia,” he said.

Medvedev claimed that the conflict in Ukraine is a war against Russia by a proxy, which was long in the making.

“The behaviour of Washington and others this year is the last warning to all nations: there can be no business with the Anglo-Saxon world [because> it is a thief, a swindler, a card-sharp that could do anything,” he wrote.

According to Medvedev, it will be years or possibly decades before Russia’s relations with the West return to normal.

“From now on we will do without them until a new generation of sensible politicians comes to power there. We will be careful and alert. We will develop relations with the rest of the world,” he wrote.

However, Medvedev argued that the loss of Western leadership could be a net positive, considering what he called the moral bankruptcy of the US-led neo-colonial order.

“Elites that caused the financial meltdown of 2008 and the ongoing global crisis are unable to claim global leadership,” he wrote.

“The West is incapable of offering to the world any new ideas, which would take humanity forward, solve global problems, or provide collective security,” the former president insisted.

Medvedev said he expects a number of regional blocs with distinct values and governing principles to develop soon, which will help Russia get a position in the new system.

Russia-US tensions

There has been increase in Russia-US tensions amid the fighting in Ukraine, which is now in its the 10th month.

Earlier this month, Russia’s Foreign Ministry had warned that if the US delivers sophisticated air defence systems to Ukraine, those systems and any crews that accompany them would be a “legitimate target” for the Russian military, a blunt threat that was quickly rejected by Washington.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova had said that the US had “effectively become a party” to the war by providing Ukraine with weapons and training its troops.

She added that if reports about US intentions to provide Kyiv with Patriot surface-to-air missile system prove true, it would become “another provocative move by the US” and broaden its involvement in the hostilities, “entailing possible consequences.”

“Any weapons systems supplied to Ukraine, including the Patriot, along with the personnel servicing them, have been and will remain legitimate priority targets for the Russian armed forces,” Zakharova declared.

Asked about the Russian warning, Pentagon spokesperson Air Force Gen. Pat Ryder responded that the US was “not going to allow comments from Russia to dictate the security assistance that we provide to Ukraine.”

“I find it ironic and very telling that officials from a country that brutally attacked its neighbour — in an illegal and unprovoked invasion, through a campaign that is deliberately targeting and killing innocent civilians and destroying civilian infrastructure — that they would choose to use words like provocative to describe defensive systems that are meant to save lives and protect civilians,” Ryder said.

With inputs from agencies

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