The former Russian president decided to send a diplomatic message to the UK after Argentina’s victory in the World Cup final.
The current vice-president of the Russian Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, on Monday December 19 congratulated the Argentina team on Twitter for their victory against France in the final of the World Cup, and took the opportunity to ask the United Kingdom of “render» the Falkland Islands to Argentina.
This statement is not insignificant on the part of the former Russian president, who was still perceived not long ago in the West as a more moderate political leader than Vladimir Putin, but who multiplies belligerent statements against the United States and European countries since the start of the war in Ukraine last February. Dmitry Medvedev had already announced before the semi-finals that he wanted to see an Argentina-Morocco final, since in such a scenario there would not have been countries considered by Russia as “unfriendly” finally. In March 2022, the Kremlin had indeed classified all the countries which imposed sanctions against Russia following the invasion of Ukraine as countries “unfriendly“.
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“Duplicity and cynicism”
The Falkland Islands, located in the southwest Atlantic, have been the subject of a territorial dispute between Argentina and the United Kingdom for 200 years. In April 1982, Argentina had tried to regain control of it militarily, which had provoked a war of almost three months between Argentina and the United Kingdom. The Argentines had ultimately lost the war, losing 649 soldiers while the British lost 255.
According to the Russian news agency TASS, Dmitry Medvedev made this statement to criticize the British Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, who regularly asks Russia to withdraw its troops from Ukraine, the only way for the British Prime Minister to achieve a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine. In addition to his tweet, the former Russian president reportedly denounced “lies, duplicity and extreme cynicism» British leaders. “They had better withdraw from the Falkland Islands and return them to the Argentinians. The Falklands are not British, but Argentinian!“.
By emphasizing this territorial dispute between Buenos Aires and London, Russia points to what it considers to be “a double standardof certain Western countries in the handling of territorial disputes in the world. In 2014, during the annexation of Crimea, Russia also invoked the case of Mayotte, a French overseas department claimed by the Comoros to justify its policy.
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