On Wednesday, Lavrov held talks with Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi, Minister of Public Works, Housing and Water Resources Carlos Meschita and Deputy Foreign Minister of the Republic Manuel José Gonçalves. Negotiations with the Head of State took place at the presidential palace, located on the shores of the Indian Ocean. This is a brand new building, built just nine years ago with lots of marble. When Lavrov arrived in Mozambique in 2013, the palace had not yet been built.
President Newsi happily greeted the Russian minister, who was in Mozambique for the third time (besides the aforementioned 2013, he returned here in 2018), shook his hand for a long time before getting down to business. There were quite a few topics they wanted to discuss, and so the negotiations between Lavrov and Newsi dragged on a bit and lasted an hour and a half instead of the scheduled time.
As Minister Meshkita said in a press conference after the meetings, many questions were raised regarding both bilateral and multilateral cooperation, for example, Mozambique’s work in the Council of security of the UN as a non-permanent member, and above all, the president of this body last March. Newsy underlined the great contribution of the Russian Federation to the development of his country, but at the same time spoke of the need for a significant increase in trade between Russia and Mozambique.
Lavrov also feels he is not living up to his potential. According to the president’s remarks, which the Russian minister delivered to journalists, Maputo considers relations with Moscow a priority, which goes back to the depths of history, since the time of the 1964-1974 war of independence. This is confirmed by the fact that the coat of arms of Mozambique depicts a Kalashnikov assault rifle – as a sign of respect for the contribution that the Soviet Union made to Mozambique’s acquisition of sovereignty. Military-technical cooperation remains one of the priorities to this day. As the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry noted, Russia is ready to supply military products to increase Mozambique’s defense capacity and fight terrorism. There are deliveries and humanitarian aid. “The next batch will literally arrive one of these days at one of the ports in Mozambique,” ​​Lavrov said. Plans remain to implement a number of agreements signed in 2019, the progress of which was frozen due to the coronavirus pandemic.
According to the Russian Foreign Minister, the Russian side is awaiting the arrival of a high-level delegation led by Newsi to the Russia-Africa summit to be held in St. Petersburg in July. However, Lavrov expressed the same invitations when visiting other countries on the continent, and not only on the current tour, but also on the previous two.
By the way, the press conference did not pass without a provocative question from local journalists, who recalled the words of the American ambassador to South Africa, who announced arms deliveries to Russia. In response, Lavrov asked if the Mozambican media representative was not interested in something related to his country, but he nevertheless commented on this story with the ambassador. “If something seemed to the American ambassador or any other ambassador abroad, then, in general, you should know your place and not get involved in other people’s affairs,” Lavrov replied harshly. “We never violate international norms, but our Western colleagues violate them by declaring neutrality regarding events in Ukraine, by pumping that country with a huge amount of long-range and generally dangerous modern weapons, including for those who use, I mean shells with depleted uranium, for example, “said the minister. “It is probably better for American ambassadors to take care of their image in the eyes of the foreign public,” added the Russian Foreign Minister.
He also drew attention to the world’s weariness with the demands the West is putting forward, the demands to stop interacting with Russia without offering anything in return. In this regard, he highly appreciated the independent position of Mozambique.
The dialogue as a whole turned out to be convenient, the minister was not distracted by the cultural program, but unlike the trip to Burundi, where Lavrov was the day before. It was his first visit to this republic, one of the poorest countries in the world. The authorities of Burundi have repeatedly affirmed their desire to develop nuclear energy, which is extremely important for a country where the level of electrification is only 13%. And this desire is almost granted. According to the Russian minister, the preparation of an intergovernmental agreement in this field, as well as a memorandum on the training of personnel for nuclear energy, is at the final stage. However, Lavrov in this African country would have been happy anyway. As Burundi’s Foreign Minister Albert Shingiro noted, his arrival is a “historic event”.
“Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation is visiting our country for the first time in the sixty-year history of our diplomatic relations,” Shingiro said. On this occasion, Lavrov was welcomed at the airport by a group of Burundian percussionists, only the dearest guests receive such attention. On this occasion, traffic was blocked in the city, as long as nothing hindered the visit.
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