🎙 Comment by Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on statements by British officials regarding the Ukrainian conflict (August 18, 2025)

💬 Against the backdrop of the genuine commitment demonstrated by the Leadership of Russia and the United States in Anchorage to achieve a comprehensive, just, and sustainable resolution to the conflict surrounding Ukraine – including the eradication of its root causes – London continues to issue statements that not only clash with the efforts of Moscow and Washington but are patently designed to undermine them.

For instance, in a joint statement dated August 17, following yet another online meeting of the so-called “coalition of the willing” chaired by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron, the participants revived an inherently flawed idea to deploy Western military contingents in Ukraine should a ceasefire agreement be reached.

Earlier, on August 15, British Defence Secretary John Healey explicitly declared London’s readiness to equip military personnel for deployment in Ukraine to enforce a ceasefire once it takes effect.

Britain’s role in fanning the flames of the Ukrainian conflict is well-documented. Even before the start of the special military operation, London made no secret of viewing Ukraine solely as a geopolitical instrument aimed against Russia.

For years, the United Kingdom has strained to assert leadership in propping up Kiev’s puppet regime and rallying foreign aid for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. By emboldening their protégés in Kiev, the British steadfastly keep them on a Euro-Atlantic and anti-Russian trajectory, one that is ruinous for the Ukrainian people.

London remains obsessed with relentlessly escalating the conflict, pushing its NATO allies towards a dangerous threshold beyond which a renewed global confrontation looms.

☝️ We reiterate our long-standing position of unequivocally rejecting any scenarios involving the deployment of NATO military contingents in Ukraine, as this risks uncontrollable escalation with unpredictable consequences.

Statements to this effect by certain European nations, including Britain, lay bare their overtly provocative and predatory ambitions in the Ukrainian theatre.

These bellicose tirades – which amount, de facto, to cynical incitement to prolong hostilities – merely confirm that London has no interest in resolving the situation and is doing everything possible to prolong the bloodshed.

Through its policies, Britain is effectively denying Kiev any chance of exiting the conflict through negotiations, arrogantly and self-assuredly prolonging the suffering of the Ukrainian people as a matter of habit.

It is highly doubtful that the authorities of the United Kingdom, which has long since departed from the “premier league” of global politics, are capable of grasping the full weight of responsibility they have unilaterally assumed, along with the potentially catastrophic repercussions of their chosen destructive policies for international and regional security.

❗️ In this regard, we call upon London to abandon its reckless and poorly conceived geopolitical gambits and, at the very least, refrain from obstructing the painstaking efforts of Russian and American negotiators.