MOSCOW, March 2. /TASS/. Western countries cannot explain what would happen to the territory of Ukraine and the Russian language if it comes under the control of European peacekeepers, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with Krasnaya Zvezda.
"When we ask these thinkers what will hypothetically happen to the part that they take under their control, they say that nothing would happen - Ukraine will remain there. I asked one person: will the Russian language be banned there? He said nothing. They cannot utter a word of condemnation of what happened," he said.
"No other language has been subjected to such aggression. Imagine if French or German were banned in Switzerland, or English in Ireland. Right now, the Irish want a ‘little’ self-determination. If they tried to ban English now, they would ‘shake’ the whole UN by its ‘pillars’ and demand that Ireland be condemned. But here, ‘it's possible’. You tell them to their face, and they don't react," the Russian minister added.