The G7 “will never recognize” the borders that Russia wants to impose by force in its war in Ukraine, the foreign ministers of the G7, which brings together the world’s seven most industrialized nations, said on Saturday.
“We will never recognize the borders that Russia tries to change with its military intervention,” the ministers said in a statement released after a meeting in Wangels, northern Germany. “We will maintain our commitment to support the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, including Crimea (…)”, they specified.
The head of German diplomacy, Annalena Baerbock, whose country assumes the presidency of the G7 this year, insisted that Ukraine should “decide for itself on the matter because it is its territory.” “We will support the measures (…) that Ukraine will take to guarantee freedom and peace in the country,” she said during a press conference at the end of the meeting.
These statements come as fighting intensifies in the Donbass region (east), controlled in part since 2014 by pro-Russian separatists and in which Moscow has focused its offensive for a few weeks, but without making significant progress.
The ministers again called on Russia to “end the war that was started without provocation [by Ukraine] and the tragic suffering and loss of human life that it continues to cause.” They also called on Belarus to “stop facilitating Russia’s intervention and respect its international commitments.”
The seven countries (Germany, Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom) also condemned “irresponsible threats of the use of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons” by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The G7 promised to “expand economic sanctions” on Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine to “sectors on which Russia is particularly dependent” and called on China not to undermine these punitive measures. “We ask China not to help Russia in its war of aggression against Ukraine, not to undermine the sanctions imposed on Russia for its attack on Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, not to justify Russia’s action in Ukraine, and not to renounce information manipulation, disinformation and other measures to legitimize Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine,” the final statement stipulates.
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