Meet the Permanent Representative of Russia to the OSCE, Mr. Alexander Lukashevich

Ambassador Alexander Lukashevich is a very experienced diplomat and already the third time assigned in Vienna.

Since he took up his first post in Vienna in 1996 as Counsellor at the Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the OSCE, he has been in Vienna for a total of about 12 years. 

Since August 27, 2015, Ambassador Alexander Lukashevich has been the Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).

According to an online briefing of June 3, 2021, with the International Affairs journal of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, about challenges the Russian diplomacy is facing in OSCE, he is rather critical about the development within the OSCE, after his many years at the OSCE.

Ambassador Lukashevich concludes at the end of his reflections and based on his experience that the Organization is experiencing a long-running crisis: "After nearly 25 years of dealing with issues related to pan-European cooperation, I am witnessing, to my profound regret, the decline of this organization. Both the OSCE proper and the Council of Europe have been losing strength. What we see is a race for the dominance of the purely “Atlantist” point of view."

He also criticized Helga Schmidt, the new Secretary General, for taking only the Western view of Kyiv as regards the situation in the south-east of Ukraine, the scene of a long-running conflict between the self-declared Donetsk and Lugansk republics and Kyiv. Thus, although she visited the Donbass, she only visited the territories which are currently under the control of Kyiv, but did not bother to visit "the regions in the south-east of Ukraine, whereas all the issues of discord and political tension are concentrated where civilian infrastructure facilities - houses, schools, hospitals - come under fire". The full article can be downloaded here.

Regarding last week's three Ukraine talks, Monday in Geneva between the U.S. and Russia, Wednesday in Brussels between NATO and Russia (NATO Russia Council), and finally Thursday in Vienna between 57 nations including all participants (OSCE), Russia's representative to the OSCE said, that this week’s discussions had been "really disappointing," with the U.S., NATO and other OSCE countries not providing the "very substantial, in-depth" response to Russia’s proposals that Moscow had expected.

Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the OSCE

International Affairs, a journal of Russia’s Foreign Ministry