Lavrov: The Master of Diplomacy

His role model and highest example is the Russian Foreign Minister and advisor to the empire in the 19th century, Alexander Gorchakov, who managed to restore Russian influence in Europe under difficult and almost impossible circumstances. He follows in the footsteps of the great Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, who held his position from 1957 to 1985 and countered all Western conspiracies during the Cold War. Last Friday, he turned 75 years old and deserved the highest honors from President Vladimir Putin with the Order of Saint Andrew. He is the fourth Foreign Minister of Russia since the dissolution of the former Soviet Union, and he has been credited with convincing many from the “peoples of the South” that a unipolar world cannot be a friend or ally to African, Asian, and Latin American peoples. Over more than two decades, since becoming Foreign Minister in 2004, he has served his country and defended its interests in international forums and during major crises that the world has faced in the past twenty years, and he is credited with thwarting all the policies drawn up by the West in “dark rooms” to isolate Russia after February 2022.

Some describe him as the Foreign Minister who transcends time and eras; because he was Russia’s permanent representative to the United Nations during President Yeltsin’s time, and became the Russian Foreign Minister in 2004 during President Putin’s time, and when President Dmitry Medvedev assumed the presidency, he remained the Russian Foreign Minister, expressing the state’s and the Russian people’s confidence in his leadership of Russian diplomacy. Some in Washington see him as similar to the American actor Anthony Quinn; and for this reason, one of the major American television networks at the beginning of the 21st century described him as the “man for tough missions.”

I am talking about the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who has worked professionally and competently for decades in both action and speech to serve the goals of the Russian people. Over the past two decades, he has been going to his office at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, located in one of the skyscrapers built by leader Joseph Stalin, which reveals Lavrov’s complete commitment and professionalism, no less than the commitment of soldiers on the front lines; because Lavrov believes that “diplomacy” is a force no less effective and impactful than the Russian weapons on the battlefield, such as the Kalashnikov, and the “Avangard” and “Kinzhal” missiles. Since studying at the Institute of International Studies and starting his work at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he has taken upon himself the necessity for Russia to remain, as it always has been, among the great powers. And anyone who reviews how Lavrov countered Western black propaganda against Russia after 2014 will be convinced that he is a diplomat of a special kind, possessing all the qualities of political wisdom that “Peter the Great” possessed, and that he has inherited the wisdom of the emperors Boris Godunov and Alexander I and their cunning.

His responses to journalists’ questions, especially Western journalists, confirm that he is skilled in formulating answers that combine facts and sarcasm, and this is because he has a rich vocabulary in many languages, including Sri Lankan and French, but he also loves the words and richness of the Russian language, which he acquired from the masterpieces of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Alexander Pushkin, Lermontov, and Boris Pasternak; therefore, his answers are imbued with the logic and persuasion reflected in the music and melodies of Anton Rubinstein, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and Igor Stravinsky.

Everyone who has dealt with Lavrov has realized that his diplomatic defenses of his country’s interests are similar in strength, dimensions, and solidity to the giant and famous Russian defense systems, such as “Pantsir,” “S-400,” and “S-500” with their layered and long-range defense capabilities; and for this reason, he has succeeded in conveying Russia’s concerns about what was being plotted against it in the Ukrainian and Georgian backyards. And after more than 3 years of war in Ukraine, Lavrov proves once again that “nations do not withdraw from history,” and that everything he presented to his counterparts in the West has now been acknowledged by the United States, on the lips of its President Donald Trump, who admitted that the cause of the war is “NATO,” not Russia.

During 21 years of work as Foreign Minister, Lavrov has solidified Russia’s image as a stabilizing factor in Europe during the six centuries before the collapse of the Soviet Union, and that it will return, as it was in the past, to be a skilled player in shaping and drawing a world whose equations cannot be interacted with without the Russian bear.

Everyone who has met him and known him has said one thing about him; that he sees “the world is Russia”; because Lavrov, who is 75 years old, born in 1950, sees in “Russian geography” that spans about 17 million square kilometers, and extends from north to south for about 4,000 kilometers, and from east to west for about 10,000 kilometers, and has borders with 16 countries, as the whole world, and as the axis of “political interactions” in the entire inhabited world, not only because it is a permanent member of the Security Council, and has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world, exceeding 6,500 nuclear warheads, according to data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, but also because it is a country that possesses many elements of soft power, such as music, art, and Russian literature that is difficult to resist reading.

Unstoppable Contributions Lavrov believes that his country has always been targeted, not just today; but for a long time; and for this reason, the scene of the collapse of the Soviet Union never leaves Lavrov, and he feels that there are those who want to steal everything from his country, even the “values of sacrifice” that were epitomized by about 28 million victims that Russia offered for victory over Nazism in World War II, while others are trying to make the victory exclusively theirs without the Russians at the present time; and for this reason, the Russians credit Lavrov for standing against all attempts to falsify the history of World War II with the aim of depriving Russia of these sacrifices that humanity has never known before.

The American Turnaround Lavrov realized from the first day of the war in Ukraine that the West’s plan was based on isolating Russia; and for this reason, Lavrov’s vision was based on not leaving any room for the West to play its game against the Russian nation. And after 3 years of visits and shuttle trips to Africa, Asia, and Latin America, the voting in the United Nations General Assembly and the Security Council revealed that Russia was and will never be an isolated country, and this is one of the main reasons behind the American turnaround and the administration of President Donald Trump towards Moscow again; because many African and Asian countries, and Latin American countries, and even countries in the heart of Europe reject the “approach” that called for isolating Russia, whether from the world or Europe, and perhaps Lavrov’s foreign tours since the Russian-Ukrainian war are a renewed proof of Sergei Lavrov’s “panoramic vision,” which is based on the centrality of the Russian role in shaping global political and security interactions.