Excerpt from Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's interview for the Nuremberg documentary, Moscow, November 20, 2025
20 November 2025 09:45
1939-20-11-2025
Question: Why do these unshakable rules get violated in Europe? Immunity to the Nazi virus has significantly weakened. Why is that do you think? Who is trying to revise the Nuremberg Trial verdicts, and to what end?
Sergey Lavrov: I believe all of this reflects, first and foremost, the West's position which has never been steeped in justice or any ideals whatsoever. It has always relied on containing competitors.
Many historians are of the opinion that in the early days of the Second World War, Western countries, particularly Britain and the United States, waited to see who was going to gain the upper hand, Adolf Hitler or the Soviet Union. There was a reason it took them so long to open the second front. It goes without saying that they did not want Hitler to achieve an unconditional victory. Had he seized the riches of the Soviet Union, his empire would have become unbreakable.
The Lend-Lease was launched immediately after the Great Patriotic War broke out and was a great accomplishment in the history of Russia-US relations. We had joint projects to deliver supplies across the North Sea with the British as well.
We cherish this memory. The last time President Putin mentioned it was during his summit with US President Donald Trump in Alaska. It was truly touching to see the Americans in Alaska preserve the hallowed memory of those years of alliance. President Putin laid flowers at that monument.
However, the principles of wartime brotherhood were quickly put to a rigorous test. Less than a year after Victory, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered his Fulton speech about isolating and fencing off the Soviet Union and lowering an Iron Curtain to prevent the communist scourge from spreading to other countries.
The main reason behind Nazism rearing its ugly head lies in what was happening in the countries such as the Baltic states which cultivated a genetic hatred of everything related to our shared history, including vocal refusal to acknowledge the immense contribution the Soviet Union had made to advance these backward territories and to build their own industry and infrastructure for them.
This hatred runs deep in their genes, It was widely fueled by the elites of the Baltic states and major Western actors, who saw it as an another chance to annoy and to destabilise the Soviet Union, later Russia, when we granted independence to the Baltic states.
This Nazi scourge spread rapidly to manifest itself in marches of veterans and torchlight processions. Look at what is happening in Finland, which enjoyed a reputation of a neutral state in the post-war period. That country promotes conciliation and consensus; it was behind the Helsinki process that led to the creation of the OSCE.
Yet now, in his remarks, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, at one point my counterpart as foreign minister, says that the Nazi charge is not going anywhere.
We are now talking about Finland as one of Hitler's most devout allies. It took part in imposing the Siege of Leningrad and perpetrating other inhumane acts, such as setting up concentration camps. We didn't feel like bringing this matter up earlier, because we thought the lessons had been learned. Not really. Nothing has been learned.
Nationalism has long been evident in Ukraine, long before the special military operation and long before the February 2014 coup. A couple of years before that coup, US Congress examined an inquiry regarding the creation and ongoing activities of the Azov battalion in Ukraine. It was recognised as an extremist organisation. The congressional resolution was adopted which proscribed any efforts to support it. Later, the Americans forgot about the resolution adopted by their own legislative body.
Torchlight processions in Ukraine went unnoticed for years on end. Moreover, President Petro Poroshenko and President Vladimir Zelensky made sure no attempts were made to disrupt these marches.
The developments in Germany are the saddest part, though. I noticed a change in the mood of our German dialogue partners a long time ago, ten years at least, in my dealings with the German counterparts, several of them, including the current President of Germany Frank-Walter Steinmeier. Other ministry officials who communicated at different levels with our counterparts from the German Foreign Ministry and other government agencies noticed this change as well. I'd be hard pressed to come up with accurate quotes, but if I were to summarise the message they tried to convey it was that they had long since paid up their debt and atoned for everything Hitler had done, and they owe nothing to anyone anymore.
I mentioned this in an interview many years ago. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is now in office. He proudly stated that Germany must once again become Europe's strongest army. This once again shows that no lessons have been learned, at least by Merz and his inner circle.
It is gratifying to see that the German people do not let these metamorphoses go unnoticed. The lowest ever Merz government approval ratings can be attributed not only to economic difficulties, but also to overt revanchism, which could lead Germany into catastrophe this time again.
We cannot afford to let all the trends unfolding in the countries around us play out unchecked. This concerns the Baltic states, Ukraine, and Germany. In a number of European countries, Poland included, monuments to the heroes who liberated Europe are being torn down, while monuments are being erected (such as in Ukraine) to Roman Shukhevich, Stepan Bandera, and other Nazi puppets whose remembrance and glorification must be outlawed under the Nuremberg Tribunal's verdict.
The West, primarily Europe, is collectively pushing ideas about setting up tribunals against the Russian army, pushing all kinds of false claims about crimes allegedly committed by our military without providing any evidence to back it up. We oppose this provocation with our own efforts to establish the factual basis of our stance.
Russia's Investigative Committee has been looking into these matters since the bloody crimes in Odessa in 2014, when frontline aviation bombed cities including Lugansk, and artillery fire targeted peaceful cities. Using regular army in internal conflicts is prohibited by international humanitarian law.
Look at where the West stands to see once again its duplicity and hypocrisy. There is a compelling example to prove it. During Maidan protests in late 2013-early 2014, the West, including NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, vocally called on then President Viktor Yanukovich not to use the army against peaceful protesters who for weeks staged the West-fuelled provocations on the Maidan.
Shortly after the coup that brought to power the people who didn't give a hoot about the guarantees provided by France, Germany, and Poland under the agreement reached by the opposition and Yanukovich, they seized government buildings. The first thing they announced was they would cancel the status of the Russian language in Ukraine. Next thing they did was send militant groups aka friendship trains to storm the building of the Supreme Council of Crimea. After these lads began using militants and military force against those they called terrorists, meaning the people of Donbass who refused to recognise the coup, NATO - through the same secretary general - called on the new Ukrainian authorities to use force against peaceful citizens, but do so measurably. That is, Yanukovich was told not to use any force, while the new authorities were allowed to use force measurably.
Everything we have put on record with regard to the crimes committed by the Kiev regime after the coup is of great importance. Without a doubt, these materials will come handy over time, and the criminals will get the punishment they deserve. In addition to the Investigative Committee of Russia, this work is being carried out by the International Public Tribunal on Kiev Regime's Crimes established by a member of the Russian Civic Chamber Maxim Grigoryev.
The Foreign Ministry created the position of Foreign Ministry Commissioner for Human Rights, Democracy, and the Rule of Law quite a while ago. The commissioner publishes thematic reports annually. In April, the report titled "The 80th Anniversary of the Great Victory: The Shadow of Nazism Once Again Falls over Europe" was released. This is an illuminating report based on numerous facts and authentic documents, including the ones we obtained from international and governmental organisations in Europe.
A new position - Ambassador-at-Large for the Crimes of the Kiev Regime - was recently created at the Ministry manned by renowned politician Rodion Miroshnik, who was personally involved in many events related to implementation of the Minsk Agreements, which were deliberately disrupted and which no one intended to act upon. This, too, is part of the record. The agreements to preserve the territorial integrity of Ukraine by granting special status to Donbass territories have been approved by the UN Security Council, yet the Kiev regime constantly violated every provision of these agreements from ceasefire to refusal to use military force.
A couple of years ago, former President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, former Federal Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel, and former President of France François Hollande who signed these agreements admitted they never intended to implement them. That speaks volumes about their approach to international law. All UN member states without exception must comply with the UN Security Council resolutions and the Nuremberg Tribunal verdicts.
We see that revisionism attributed to Russia and China is actually displayed by those who erode our collective accomplishments and try to re-open the door to hate-fueled ideology and practice.
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