Russian foreign minister accuses EU of 'robbery,’ ‘piracy'

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused the EU on Thursday of “robbery” and “piracy” for measures targeting vessels carrying Russian energy cargoes.

He said Moscow would respond to any seizures of Russian commercial ships.

Lavrov told Russian state television broadcaster VGTRK that the EU had introduced the term “shadow fleet” to describe vessels that do not comply with its restrictions on Russian energy exports.

“The European Union has long since invented this concept. It does not appear in any document,” said Lavrov.

He said the EU was seeking to restrict Russia’s ability to earn revenue on international markets and argued that Brussels was treating its own decisions as superior to international law.

Lavrov noted that the EU authorized its members not only to stop and inspect vessels, but also to seize and sell their cargoes, with proceeds potentially transferred to Ukraine.

“The President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin has very clearly and calmly said that we will respond to this robbery, to this piracy, in kind,” he said. “We will choose the targets ourselves.”

He said potential targets would be vessels operating in the interests of countries that had made “robbery and piracy” part of their official policy.

Lavrov also criticized Japan's policy toward Russia, contrasting it with that of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who understood that Japan's national interests could not be secured without cooperation from Russia.

His successors, on the contrary, had chosen to pursue them in closer coordination with the US and through increased militarization, he said.

Lavrov also said he was astonished by a statement of Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi, who said he discussed bilateral matters and the regional situation on the sidelines of the ASEAN forum in the Philippines.

"I was astonished, because this happened during an official banquet, where there was a long table and all the ministers were seated. Suddenly, someone tapped me on the shoulder from behind. I turned around — there stood my Japanese colleague, saying how glad he was to see me, how wonderful," he said.

Lavrov said he did not even have time to stand up.

"I shook his hand, and he went back to his seat. And that, they call 'discussing bilateral and regional issues,’" he noted.

"Recently, there was information that some Japanese delegation of businessmen had come. They openly said that they had firm instructions from the country's leadership not to discuss any projects with us," he added.