Foreign Minister Schallenberg Calls for Non-Exaggeration Regarding Russia

Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg has pleaded for maintaining a sense of proportion towards Moscow about the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine. "We must not overshoot the mark, for example by introducing a visa ban for 144 million Russians," said Schallenberg on Monday, according to his spokeswoman, at a conference of the elite French university Sciences Po in Paris. Russia will remain part of European history and culture, according to Die Presse.

According to ORF, The Foreign Minister emphasized that there was no doubt about Ukraine's full support in its struggle for sovereignty and territorial integrity. "The brutal war of aggression instigated by Russia is madness. At the same time, we have to think about the day after, the week after, and the months after," said Schallenberg. Because the European security architecture will have to include Russia in one way or another in the future as a permanent member of the UN Security Council and as a nuclear power.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) must be retained, demanded Schallenberg, and once again criticized the fact that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was not invited to the most recent OSCE meeting in Poland. "The OSCE is one of the few remaining platforms on which Russian diplomats sit and have to listen to our arguments and our sharp criticism of the Russian war of aggression," said the Foreign Minister. Schallenberg has one of the biggest tasks named “Maintaining a sense of proportion” for 2023. Another is to maintain unity. "What we do today will determine the status of the free world in the years to come," he said, as it is stated in Die Presse.