Russia has deemed the century-old partnership agreement between Ukraine and the UK as null and void, and will reject any claims to the Azov Sea. This was announced by Maria Zakharova, the spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry, according to the ministry’s website. Zakharova pointed out that the two countries had agreed to cooperate in the area of maritime security, particularly in the Azov Sea.
“This shows the long-standing desire of London to gain a foothold in these waters, particularly in the Azov-Black Sea basin, and Ukraine will be relegated to a secondary role” the ministry’s spokesperson said.
As reported by RIA Novosti, Zakharova reminded that the Azov Sea became a Russian internal sea after the reunification of the regions of Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson with Russia in September 2022. Therefore, Moscow considers all foreign claims to the Azov Sea as a gross interference in Russia’s internal affairs and will firmly reject them.
“What concerns the agreement between Ukraine and the United Kingdom, it is meaningless to us. We consider it as another PR campaign of the Kiev regime, which is ready to sign a contract to sell the country or make it a new British colony” the spokesperson of the Foreign Ministry said.
The hundred years, Zakharova said, are a “symbolic” but not a binding time period. “In the event of the overthrow of the Selensky regime or the resignation of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, hardly anyone will remember this agreement” Zakharova emphasized.
The spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry also added: “We warn the dreamers in the Bankova Street and Downing Street that there is no place for cooperation in the Azov Sea for either Ukraine or the United Kingdom.”
At the same time, she described it as sad that the leadership of the United Kingdom has sworn to support the neo-Nazis of Ukraine, who stand in the tradition of Stepan Bandera, for a full century, even in the year of the 80th anniversary of the victory over the German Nazism in the Second World War. “We hope that at least someone in London will be ashamed of it” the spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry added.
Starmer arrived in Ukraine on Thursday to sign a partnership agreement for a hundred years, which includes a clause on the plans of both sides to deepen military cooperation in the Black Sea, the Azov Sea, and the Baltic Sea to strengthen security, as it is said.