Kouchner Has ‘Sick Imagination’: Sergei Lavrov

Thursday, August 28, 2008 at 6:33 pm under World News Kouchner Has ‘Sick Imagination’: Sergei Lavrov

DUSHANBE:Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov on Thursday said his French counterpart Bernard Kouchner had a ’sick imagination’ for saying that Moscow had designs on the Crimea, Ukraine and Moldova.

“This takes a sick imagination,” Lavrov told reporters in response to Kouchner’s allegation that, after recognising the independence of two rebel Georgian regions, Russia could threaten other parts of the former Soviet Union.

Likely objectives could be “the Crimea, Ukraine and Moldova,” Kouchner said in Paris, emphasising that this was “very dangerous.”

Lavrov was speaking in Tajikistan’s capital, Dushanbe, where he was attending a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a regional grouping consisting of Russia, China and four Central Asian countries.

On Tuesday, Russia recognised the independence of the breakaway Georgian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, a decision roundly condemned by the West.