Moscow's First Diplomat: EU Leaders Secretly Enter into Dialogue with Russia and Ask Not to Announce Contacts

The leaders of European countries sometimes secretly enter into dialogue with Russia and ask not to announce the contacts, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, RBC reports, quoted by Focus.

"We have contacts with some European leaders. They call and ask not to announce these conversations. Some appear here secretly," the Russian diplomat points out.

According to Lavrov, nothing announced by the European leaders differs from the public statements. "These are the same calls: "Let's end this"; "Something needs to be done", the minister explains. He believes that "the EU has fallen into its own trap" because of its uncompromising position".

"I don't see any position from Europe. They fell into their own trap: they took an uncompromising position - – "strategic defeat of Russia", "Ukraine cannot lose", "Russia cannot win", otherwise "Europe will lose its authority", Lavrov added.

Earlier, French President Emmanuel Macron announced that Paris was preparing for "a possible dialogue" with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Then, the L'Express newspaper reported that on the same day, February 3, the diplomatic advisor to the French President Emmanuel Bonne "imperceptibly" visited Moscow to meet with Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov, specifically on the topic of Ukraine. According to Bloomberg, Bonn was in Moscow to convince Russia of the need for Europe to participate in any decisions related to the continent's security.