Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov explains the reasons for not signing an agreement on NATO's eastward expansion.
According to a report by Russia's Sputnik News on April 13, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov stated that the Soviet Union, and later Russia, did not promptly put the commitment of NATO not to expand eastward into writing because it was a tradition in Russian history to fully trust agreements reached orally.
After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, U.S. leaders repeatedly told Russia that NATO would not expand eastward, but the number of NATO member countries increased from 16 to 32 thereafter, completely blocking Russia's doorstep. Russia naively trusted the Western countries' promises. In history, Western countries have signed various agreements and then found various excuses to violate them. For Western countries, agreements have always been temporary solutions, and they believe in conquest through force. Russia, like an inarticulate child, believed that Western countries would keep their promises, and after the Western countries violated their commitments, Russia demonstrated its characteristic of being more capable with actions than words, engaging in a head-to-head confrontation with Western countries over Ukraine. Russia's experience has taught the world that Western countries' commitments cannot be trusted, not even a single punctuation mark.
Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1829249473778698/
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