Austria’s Foreign Minister spoke with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, about a personnel package at the request of North Macedonia’s OSCE chairmanship. Then, in the plenary session, Lavrov criticized NATO, the West, the “neo-Nazi regime in Kiev” and also the OSCE.
A debate looks different. One statement followed another at the Boris Trajkovski Sports Center in the North Macedonian capital Skopje. They were allotted three minutes each – multiplied by 57. Foreign Ministers, Secretaries of State and Ambassadors from the 57 Member States of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) sat around a large rectangular table in the Thursday and read their statements. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was represented by his ambassador to the OSCE. After a brief visit the night before, he had already flown to the Middle East. But his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, did not miss the opportunity to appear in the illustrious group. The top diplomats from Ukraine, Poland and the three Baltic States did not want to sit at the same table with him and so they canceled. “How can you talk to an aggressor who is committing genocide in the member state of Ukraine?” asked Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna the day before, at a NATO meeting in Brussels.
Austria’s Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg was less afraid of contacts. At the request of North Macedonia’s OSCE Chairmanship, he met with Lavrov to discuss the OSCE’s pending personnel package on the sidelines of the Council of Ministers. The organization has not yet reached an agreement on whether general secretary Helga Schmid and three other key positions will be extended.