Quotes from Sergei Lavrov

If it acts like a terrorist, if it walks like a terrorist, if it fights like a terrorist, it's a terrorist, right?

We have become stronger economically; we have been successfully resolving the social problems, raising the level of living - the standards of living - of the population.

Russia has every reason to dispose of its nuclear arsenal... to suit its interests and international legal obligations.

When Colonel Gadhafi started using his air force against civilians on the ground, we did not hesitate. Then we supported the resolution of the Security Council, which introduced arms embargo for Libya.

If you look at U.S. Congress, 80 percent of them have never left the U.S.A., so I'm not surprised about Russophobia in Congress.

I can only say it is not for us to decide who should lead Syria. It is for the Syrians to decide.

We can only talk to those who opt for the sovereign, territorially integral, secular, multiethnic and multi-confessional Syria.

We are not wedded to anyone in Syria. We are not concerned with any personality. We are concerned with keeping Syria in one piece, territorially integral, sovereign, independent and secular, where the rights of all groups, ethnic and others, are fully respected.

We are categorically against proliferation of nuclear weapons.

I don't think you can perpetrate war crimes with defensive weapons, with air defense systems.

The U.S.-led western alliance, while acting as an advocate of democracy, rule of law and human rights, is acting from the opposite position, rejecting the democratic principle of the sovereign right of states enshrined in the U.N. Charter and trying to decide for others what is good and what is bad.

Hours before the Georgian invasion, Russia had been working to secure a United Nations Security Council statement calling for a renunciation of force by both Georgia and South Ossetians. The statement that could have averted bloodshed was blocked by western countries.

Attempts to put pressure on Russia and to compel it to abandon its values, truth and justice have no prospects whatsoever.

When you buy a company at an auction, and you are committing yourself to pay some $300 million to the state because it was a privatization deal, and you don't pay it, is it OK? Isn't it something that deserves court procedures?

We believe that this is not right for a democracy to make revolutions the beacon of promoting democracy.

We have been protecting the lives of the Russian peacekeepers who had been attacked by their Georgian comrades, because there was a joint peacekeeping force.

Russian citizens being attacked is an attack against the Russian Federation.

If you say that your national law allows you to do something, it is fine as long as you do this inside your own territory. As long as you go international, you really have to be sure that there is an international law which you respect and which you follow.

You either deny terrorists any acceptance in the international life, or you make your double standard policy work the way it has been working - 'I don't like that guy in this country, so we will be calling him a dictator and topple him. This guy in another country also dictatorial, but he's our dictator.'

The struggle against terrorists in the territory of Syria should be structured in cooperation with the Syrian government, which clearly stated its readiness to join it.

Russia has been entirely proportionate in its military response to Georgia's attack on Russian citizens and peacekeepers.

All our security now depends on the wise decisions and cooperation of our leaders.

I wouldn't even go into the history of the last days of the Soviet Union, the withdrawal from Europe, and what promises were given at that time, because those were oral promises, and our leaders of that time strongly believe that, like in ancient Russia, a word given is better than any treaty.

The jihadists come from many European countries, Russia included, and some even from the United States; hundreds of them - if you take Europe, Russia and the U.S. - are fighting in the ranks of extremist groups.