Quotes from Sergei Lavrov

We provide transit facilities, we cooperate in equipping the Afghan army and security forces with arms and helicopters, we cooperate in training officers for law enforcement agencies.

We feel no isolation. But, having said that, I want to emphasise in particular that we do not want to go to extremes and abandon the European and American directions in our foreign economic cooperation.

In the spirit of commitment to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, we will strive to achieve real progress in disarmament and arms control.

When the Georgian army started this assault against the sleeping city of Tskhinvali, the Georgian peacekeepers, serving in one contingent with their Russian friends, joined the army and started killing the Russian comrades in arms.

We believe Russian-American relations are broader and larger than emotions and mutual grudges, including the situation with the U.S. fugitive Edward Snowden.

You cannot defeat Islamic State with airstrikes only. It's necessary to cooperate with ground troops, and the Syrian army is the most efficient and powerful ground force to fight the Islamic State.

Russia would prefer to rebuild trust rather than allow it to further corrode. That's why, in July 2007, President Putin, in the spirit of strategic openness, proposed a truly collective effort at missile defense for Europe.

I know that Britain and the United States and others ship arms in the Middle East, 10 or maybe 100 times more than the Russian does.

Crimea was not a non-nuclear zone in an international law sense but was part of Ukraine, a state which doesn't possess nuclear arms.

We have absolutely no intention of, or interest in, crossing Ukraine's borders.

Russia is doing all it can to promote early stabilisation in Ukraine.

We are certain that Ukraine needs profound constitutional reform. In all fairness, we can't see any other way to ensure the stable development of Ukraine but to sign a federal agreement.

If you think that a coup to overthrow the elected government is a coup everywhere, then you should remember how elections in Ukraine took place in 2004, how elections in Georgia took place in 2003, when the elections results have been torn and thrown away by revolutionary action.

Our stand is crystal-clear - we want peace in Ukraine, which can only be attained through broad national dialogue in which all regions and all political forces of the country must participate.

Russia has done more than any other country to support the independent Ukrainian state, including for many years subsidising its economy through low energy prices.

The attempts to distort the truth and to hide the facts behind blanket accusations have been undertaken at all stages of the Ukrainian crisis.

Frankly speaking, we don't see any other way for the steady development of the Ukrainian state apart from as a federation.

It is absolutely unacceptable to talk to Russia - or anyone for that matter - in the language of ultimatums and coercive measures.

I started, you know, to work as a diplomat during the Soviet days, and in spite of ideology being very high on the Communist Party agenda, I can assure you that in practical terms, we have always been trying to be pragmatic.

NATO cannot accept that the unconstitutional coup in Ukraine has not led to the subjugation of the whole Ukrainian nation.

Assertions that Russia has undermined efforts to strengthen partnerships on the European continent do not correspond to the facts.

We have looked into the general problems with adoption in the United States, and we discovered - on the basis of the reports written by American NGOs - we discovered that not only Russians but kids from other countries and the American-born kids have been subject to very unfortunate behavior on the part of their adopted parents.

The international community unfortunately did take sides in Libya, and we would never allow the Security Council to authorise anything similar to what happened in Libya.

I hope that the United States would cooperate with the partners to reduce its debt. The debt is a problem. The debt is with you, but unfortunately, the debt is not only with you but with us and with the rest of the world because we all, one way or another, are dependent on the dollar.