Russian Ambassador in Vienna Lyubinsky Summoned to the Foreign Ministry
Following the recognition of Donetsk and Lugans and due to the escalation of the situation in Ukraine, the Russian Ambassador in Vienna, Dmitry Lyubinsky, has been summoned to the Austrian Foreign Ministry.
The Foreign Ministry has summoned the Russian ambassador, H.E. Dmitry Yevgenevich Lyubinsky. / Picture: © Wikimedia Commons / Gugerell / CC0
The Austrian Foreign Ministry has summoned the Russian ambassador to Austria.
The reason behind this, according to the Foreign Ministry, is the Kremlin's decision to recognize the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics in eastern Ukraine as independent people's republics and that Vladimir Putin has endorsed the claims of Russian-backed separatists to the entire Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.
The recognition of the territories is in clear contradiction to the Minsk Agreement.
The Secretary General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Peter Launsky-Tieffenthal, had told H.E. Lyubinsky unmistakably that the recognition of the independence of the self-proclaimed people's republics was a serious violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, which Austria condemned in the strongest terms, according to several media outlets.
As reported by Vindobona, Schallenberg and Federal President Van der Bellen had also called the recognition of the People's Republics a "blatant violation of Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity."
Russia's Ambassador to Vienna, Dmitry Yevgenevich Lyubinsky, commented on his conversation in Russian on Facebook as follows:
"I was invited to a conversation with the Secretary General of the Austrian Foreign Ministry Peter Launsky-Tieffenthal, who presented the essence of the latest statements of the Austrian leadership condemning Russia's recognition of the independence of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics and calling for this decision to be reversed, with the already familiar mention of the inevitable sanctions on the part of the European Union. " wrote Lyubinsky.
Western tolerance of "ultranationalist manifestations in Kiev," Ukraine's armament, and declarations of "boundless solidarity with Ukraine" had led to the developments in eastern Ukraine. These had created the impression in Kyiv that anything was possible. Russia's steps had been aimed at preventing a humanitarian catastrophe in the Donbass and not allowing "bloodshed acts by Ukrainian fighters," Lyubinsky explained. Lyubinsky also referred in this context to a statement by Van der Bellen, who had called for preventing an expansion of human suffering in eastern Ukraine.
H.E. Lyubinsky also found it "extremely symbolic" that the conversation at the Austrian Foreign Ministry coincided with the traditional Defender of the Fatherland Day wreath-laying ceremony with the heads of the Russian diplomatic missions in Vienna at the Soviet Monument to Heroes on Schwarzenbergplatz.
Defender of the Fatherland Day (День защитника Отечества) is an important day in Russia.
It is celebrated annually on February 23 and is a public and therefore non-working holiday.
On this day all defenders of the Fatherland, i.e. all soldiers are honored.
However, this day is not only for the military, because whether you yourself have served in the army is rather secondary on this day. All men and also boys are allowed to be congratulated on this day.
The day is practically a converted Men's Day and thus the equivalent of International Women's Day on March 8, which is also celebrated on a very large scale in Russia.
BMEIA Federal Ministry for Europe Integration and Foreign Affairs