What is behind the Russian threats against Italy? Andrey Kfortov, Director of the Russian Council for International Affairs, spoke for half an hour more on Sunday, March 20, the program moderated by Lucia Annunziata on Rai 3, and reiterated that Russia sees “something different” from us expect “In Moscow they say that Italy has become a ‘russophobic’ country not only towards the top, but towards the whole of Russian society, whether it’s right or wrong is up to you to judge,” said the analyst.
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As noted on Saturday, March 19, Alexei Paramonov, a senior official in Putin’s foreign ministry, accused Defense Minister Lorenzo Guerini of being an “antiRussian hawk” and accused our government of helping the Kremlin during the Covid emergency. With Rome’s positions towards Moscow, “there will be irreversible consequences in the event of further sanctions” in diplomatic relations between the two nations, Moscow threatens.
So far, no similar attacks on individual countries from Russia have been observed, except for the United States and, to a lesser extent, Great Britain. “I think this position probably expresses a form of frustration with the position of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” explains the analyst. The fact is that “the Russians have traditionally always backed the Italians,” but “Italy this time took an unexpectedly tough stance on sanctions” in Moscow, but also “on its assessment of the situation” and “its support for Ukraine,” explains Kfortov.
In other words, the Kremlin did not foresee that a country like Italy would turn its back on it after attacking Ukraine. And the government’s stance and the Foreign Ministry’s condemnation provoked “frustration” in Moscow. “My impression that this position came as a surprise to the Russian leadership, who expected something different from Italy, and perhaps the statement by the ‘Russian’ foreign ministry reflects this frustration,” the analyst concludes.