Embassy comment on confrontational UK initiatives in the area of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)

❌ The far-reaching ICT-related plans announced by the British Ministry of Defence on 29 May clearly indicate London's intent to further raise the stakes in its campaign against the mythical "Russian threat".

Rattling its cyber sabre, the British establishment has called for the mass recruitment of "hackers" into the ranks of its armed forces, along with the establishment of a specialised command structure for coordinating not only defensive but also offensive operations in the ICT domain. In essence, this is an open admission of the militarisation of the information space with the evident focus on carrying out offensive operations against Russia.

In doing so, the British side has indirectly acknowledged its role in the digital aggression already being waged against our country – via the creation, training, and sponsorship of groups such as the so-called "IT Army of Ukraine", openly praised in local media and deployed against Russia as part of London's proxy war alongside its partners. Such criminal associations may also be used by the West against other "uncooperative" states.

The long-term costs of this provocative course do not seem to bother the UK authorities. Yet this is a mistake.

❗️ The offensive cyber potential being prepared by London for use against Russia is fraught with the risk of triggering a large-scale confrontation in the ICT domain which may lead to unpredictable consequences, including for the United Kingdom itself.

🎙 Интервью Посла России в Великобритании Андрея Келина ведущему телеканала «Россия 24» Александру Кареевскому

Основные темы:
• Российско-украинские переговоры в Стамбуле
• Размещение европейского контингента на Украине
• Снятие ограничений на дальность поставляемого Киеву оружия
• Отношения Британии и Евросоюза
• Состояние британской экономики
• Поджог дома британского премьера
• Возможное возвращение Б.Джонсона в политику


💬 А.В.Келин: Мы знаем, что британский политсоветник [Джонатан] Пауэлл будет присутствовать там, в Стамбуле, во время [российско-украинских] переговоров где-то на заднем плане. Это всё [делается] с тем, чтобы влиять на позицию Украины, контролировать её, чтобы она не вышла из-под установленных Западом рамок для переговоров. Вот в этом, собственно, и состоит [британская] позиция – держать [Киев] на коротком поводке.

Смотрите интервью на YouTube-канале Посольства

🤦 Публикацию стратегического оборонного обзора британские власти сопровождают ударной дозой антироссийских заявлений.

Премьер-министр Кир Стармер невпопад попытался списать продолжающиеся при лейбористах экономические провалы на «растущую агрессию» Москвы. Оказывается, мирный проход наших кораблей через Ла-Манш ухудшает положение британских трудящихся. А министр обороны Джон Хили умудрился даже где-то разглядеть какие-то совершаемые Россией «ежедневные атаки» на Великобританию.

Посольство категорически отвергает эти подложные и нелепые обвинения.

Очень жаль, что, сменив во власти консерваторов, лейбористы продолжают высасывать из пальца всё те же русофобские небылицы, дабы списать на них свою беспомощность в экономике и обосновать «не по карману» растущие военные затраты. <...>

❗️ Россия не представляет угрозы для Соединённого Королевства и его населения. Мы не вынашиваем агрессивных планов и не собираемся нападать на Альбион. Нам это абсолютно не интересно и не нужно. <...>

Если бы британское правительство действительно стремилось к укреплению национальной и международной безопасности, то ему вместо нагнетания военной истерии следовало бы в кратчайшие сроки прекратить «войну по доверенности», развязанную против России руками подконтрольного киевского режима и встать на путь содействия всеобъемлющему мирному урегулированию.

Заодно следовало бы отменить введённые против нашей страны нелегитимные односторонние торгово-финансовые ограничения – ведь именно они, а вовсе не мифические российские «атаки», причиняют, как выразился К.Стармер, «экономические страдания» британскому населению.

Читайте полностью

⚡️ Statement by Head of the Russian delegation Vladimir Medinsky following the second round of resumed Russia-Ukraine direct talks in Istanbul (June 2, 2025)

Read in full

💬 We handed our two-part memorandum to the Turkish side.

• The first part concerns ways to achieve a durable and sustainable peace.

• The second part outlines the steps towards making a genuine ceasefire possible.

<...> The Ukrainian side took it for further review. They will study it and tell us what they think about it, and we will take it from there.

In addition to that, we resolved several practical matters.

Firstly, we will unilaterally hand over 6'000 frozen bodies of Ukrainian soldiers to the Ukrainian side. <...> Next week, we will return these bodies to the Ukrainian side so they may be laid to rest with dignity. <...>

We have agreed on the largest prisoner swap to date. All gravely wounded and seriously ill soldiers will be exchanged all for all. This is a humanitarian gesture on our part. The same approach — all for all — will be used to exchange young soldiers under the age of 25. The overall exchange quota will be at least 1'000 people from each side, possibly more. These numbers are being finalised.

Furthermore, we agreed to create permanent medical commissions that will compile reports which the parties will use to draw up exchange lists of severely wounded soldiers without having to wait for major political decisions. These exchanges will be conducted regularly as part of routine operations.

❗️ We proposed imposing a short-term ceasefire for two to three days on several stretches of the line of contact. Our military experts will work on it in coordination with the Ukrainians. <...>

The Russian army is advancing, and there are significantly more bodies of the Ukrainian soldiers in the grey zone. For this reason, we propose collecting the bodies of their fallen soldiers and transferring them immediately on-site to the opposing side for proper burial under Christian traditions. We let them know about this proposal. The Ukrainian military promised to review it promptly. <...>

Children are central to us, and I would like to say a few words about them. We’ve been hearing lately <…> that “1.5 million Ukrainian children were abducted by the Russians.” Then it came down to “200'000 Ukrainian children abducted by the Russians.” Now, the official figure is “20'000 children abducted by the Russians.” We’ve constantly asked to provide documentary evidence. Show us who these children are, give us something, such as missing child reports filed by their parents. Who are these children? They weren’t on any lists. What we get are mere numbers with no substance. <...>

We finally obtained a complete list. As you can see, it’s not 1.5 million, and not even 20'000 names. It includes 339 names. We will look into each case. We have reviewed every single inquiry lately. The Commissioner for Children’s Rights office had 101 children reunite with their families. 22 children have come back home from Ukraine and reunited with their families. Our children, too, may end up in the midst of a combat zone and lose contact with their families. <...>

This list of 339 names only underscores the fact that child abduction has, unfortunately, been turned by the Ukrainian authorities into a media show for bleeding-heart Europeans. <...> In reality, we are talking about dozens of children. None of these children have been abducted. Not a single one. These are the children who were rescued by our soldiers — often at the cost of their lives — pulled from combat zones and taken to safety. We are looking for their parents. If the parents are found, the children are returned.

☝️ Every child will reunite with their parents. All families on both sides will come together. We are working on it. It’s a matter of honour.

❓Question: What language were the talks held in?

💬 Vladimir Medinsky: I’ll give you three guesses.

❓Question: Was it Russian?

💬 Vladimir Medinsky: Correct, you got it right straight away.

🤦 The British authorities have backed up the release of their Strategic Defence Review with a fresh salvo of anti-Russian rhetoric.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer, somewhat incongruously, sought to attribute the ongoing economic failures under the Labour government to what he termed Moscow’s "growing aggression". It turns out that the peaceful passage of Russian vessels through the English Channel is somehow "hitting working people" of Britain. Meanwhile, Defence Secretary John Healey has gone so far as to allege unspecified "daily attacks" on the UK by Russia.

The Embassy categorically rejects these false and bizarre accusations.

It is regrettable that, having replaced the Conservatives, Labour continues to invent the same Russophobic fabrications in an attempt to mask its own economic ineptitude and to justify the hike in military spending that the UK can scarcely afford. <...>

❗️ Russia poses no threat to the United Kingdom and its people. We harbour no aggressive intentions and have no plans to attack Britain. We are not interested in doing so, nor do we need to. <...>

If Britain's government were truly committed to strengthening both national and international security, it could, instead of fuelling jingoistic hysteria, immediately end the proxy war unleashed against Russia by the Kiev regime and embark on a path towards a comprehensive and peaceful settlement.

The UK could also lift its illegitimate unilateral trade and financial sanctions imposed on Russia. It is these measures, rather than mythical Russian "attacks", that are generating "economic pain" for the British people, to use Mr Starmer's own words.

Read in full

"Российско-британские отношения пережили за [более чем] 450 лет их существования очень много взлётов и падений"

📺 Смотрите интервью Посла России в Великобритании Андрея Келина образовательному проекту НЬЮМ, реализуемого редакцией ТАСС ДЕТИ

Основные темы:
• Украинский кризис
• Российско-британские отношения
• Русская культура в Британии
• Искусственный интеллект и дипломатия
• Сохранение исторической памяти

📹 НЬЮМ ТАСС

📺 Watch Ambassador Andrei Kelin's interview with Sky News presenter Yalda Hakim (5 June 2025)

Key talking points:

• [Ukraine's attack on Russia's strategic aviation] is a very serious escalation and a blow to the strategic stability which we have established in our relations with the United States.

• Our resources allow us to continue military actions [in Ukraine] for a long time. But the choice now lies with Kiev — whether they choose [to find] a solution to the conflict, I mean a normal agreement that will eliminate the root causes [of the conflict], or [face] defeat and total surrender under much worse conditions.

• The Ukrainians are saying, "Let’s hold a summit". A summit for what? If Zelensky just wants to make a show <…> then it makes no sense for us. We need a summit for serious matters, not to establish a short ceasefire, but [to achieve] a solid and lasting resolution of this conflict.

• London, Brussels, Paris and Berlin are strongly resisting that we get to the end of this conflict, because they have invested a lot — politically, militarily and financially — in Ukraine and in this conflict.

• It is up to the UK and other NATO countries to decide where to spend their own money — whether on these military toys or on social welfare <...> But to my mind, all of this [the idea to lift defence spending to 3 or 5% of GDP] is an excessive effort <...> We do not represent any threat to Britain at all — neither at sea, nor in the air, nor on land. It is all an invention to distract attention from domestic issues.

Watch the interview on our YouTube channel

🎙 Russia's Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova’s answer to a media question regarding the designation of the British Council as an undesirable organisation in the Russian Federation (June 5, 2025)

❓ Question: The Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation has designated the activities of the international organisation British Council as undesirable in our country. How would you comment on this development? What, in your view, led to this decision?

💬 Maria Zakharova: As is known, the British Council has operated in Russia since the early 1990s, establishing its central representative office in Moscow in 1992. In the years that followed, the Council aggressively expanded its presence by setting up numerous regional branches, all without proper legal formalisation. Despite this expansion, the legal status of the organisation remained undefined within our nation. The requisite regulatory framework for the British Council’s operations in Russia – which should have encompassed its status, the procedure for opening branches and the conditions governing their work – was intended to be established through a separate bilateral agreement on cultural and information centres. However, the efforts to draft such a document were thwarted by London.

In response to the unfriendly anti-Russian measures taken by the British side in July 2007 concerning the so-called Alexander Litvinenko case, and in light of growing evidence of the Council’s destabilising influence on Russian soil, a decision was made to close all regional branches of the British Council in our country as of January 2008.

The sole remaining British Council office continued to operate in Moscow until March 2018. However, as part of retaliatory measures against London’s hostile actions in the so-called Skripal case, its operations were also terminated that month.

❗️ Following the start of the special military operation, the British Council aligned itself with the unprecedentedly hostile anti-Russian measures of the UK government, joining broader Western efforts to discredit the policies of our country’s leadership and undermine Russian influence globally, particularly within the CIS region. The Council employed elements of “soft power” extensively, alongside various grant programmes, systematically gathering information on the situation in Russia’s new territories, conditions along the line of contact, and other potentially sensitive data.

Although, as previously noted, the Russian branch of the British Council was forcibly shut down, the parent organisation persisted in its subversive activities from other states’ positions, drawing our compatriots into its projects. Moreover, Russian competent authorities have obtained evidence confirming that the British Council has been utilised by British intelligence services in covert operations aimed at undermining the sovereignty of independent states and in clandestine destabilising activities.

Thus, designating the British Council as an undesirable organisation in its entirety was, in essence, a matter of common sense and timing.

Until last year, this step was hindered by a legal restriction in Russian legislation, which barred foreign state-founded entities (the British Council being established by the UK government) from being declared undesirable. This loophole has now been rectified.

☝️ In light of the aforementioned circumstances, we would like to caution our partners in Russia-friendly states against fostering ties or flirting with the British. Providing favourable conditions for organisations such as the British Council – permitting them access to youth and the implementation of ostensibly harmless cultural and educational projects – poses the risk of losing control over critical social and political processes. The positions of influence gained through such activities are subsequently exploited by London to interfere in the internal affairs of other states, directly threatening their sovereignty and territorial integrity.

❗️ Speaking at Chatham House yesterday, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte candidly admitted that sustaining the conflict in Ukraine serves the Alliance's collective military-industrial interest.

Using his own words, this is a statement of fact. The proxy-war against Russia, meticulously designed in Western capitals, is centered around fully expending Ukraine's human and industrial potential in a fratricidal confrontation against its larger neighbour.

The fate of Ukraine and its inhabitants, on the other hand, is of little concern to NATO military planners.

Hence Europe's cynical obstinance in thwarting a durable negotiated settlement.

⚡️ Statement by Foundation for the Support and Protection of the Rights of Compatriots Living Abroad

📃 Recently, the Foundation for the Support and Protection of the Rights of Compatriots Living Abroad has once again become the target of a massive provocative campaign launched by a group of European media under the guise of a “journalistic investigation.”

For the third year in a row, it has been flooded by slander and misinformation that distort the actual goal and practices of its activities which are to assist Russian compatriots in protecting their legitimate interests in their respective countries of residence.

The choice of time for launching another dirty attack on the Russian human rights organisation was not accidental: obsessed with the idea of rescuing the criminal Kiev regime, the leaders of a number of European countries are trying to actively cobble up an anti-Russia front in all areas, and to wipe out everything that is Russian or “pro-Moscow.” This caveman-like goal is extrapolated to human rights, including the ethnic minority issues.

Millions of Russian compatriots living abroad, who, in their overwhelming majority, support Russia’s policy, the goals of the special military operation of the Russian Federation to demilitarise and denazify Ukraine, and to protect the civilians of Donbass have been targeted. Attempts are being made to have them change their minds, to intimidate them, to make ridiculous political accusations against them, to deport, or even to imprison them.

Each time, these propaganda campaigns are becoming increasingly aggressive and deceitful, as they repeat old tired clichés about the Foundation allegedly “funding spies, criminals, and propagandists.” Most of the accusations come down to the long-winded assertion of its “cooperation with Russian special services in conducting influence operations in the EU countries.”

❗️ It is quite obvious that these publications are based on a mixture of outright lies, covered up by speculation that has already been worn out from repeated use, which once again confirms the open participation of foreign special services in plotting this provocation, which fact, incidentally, is reported by some of the journalists involved in it. The “investigators” use not only publicly available information about the activities of our NGO, but also publish materials obtained illegally from electronic correspondence used by the Foundation for communication with its partners. The results of such a brazen hack of the Foundation’s email by special services are presented as a leak.

Through their publications, these media outlets, the list of which has almost doubled compared with last year, reveal the true goals of this campaign which are to compromise the Foundation, to push it out of Europe, to intimidate its foreign partners, and to force our compatriots to refuse to interact with it. <...>

Reacting to yet another “revelation,” we reaffirm that the Foundation has never cooperated with any special services, nor has it ever employed any members of the special services engaged in influence operations in Western countries, including the EU.

All the media’s assertions to this effect represent a gross lie and a blatant provocation.

☝️ We emphasise that the main purpose of the Foundation’s activities, as enshrined in its Charter and the regulatory legal documents of the Russian Federation governing its functions, is to provide assistance to our compatriots living abroad in order to ensure their human rights and freedoms and to protect their legal interests. <...>

We reserve the right to hold liable organisers and perpetrators of this provocative campaign targeting our NGO and publicly making false accusations against the Foundation, its employees and our partners in a number of EU member countries.

Read in full

🇷🇺 12 June marks #RussiaDay – a celebration of history, unity and national pride.

Covering over 17 million square kilometres and stretching across 11 time zones, Russia is the largest country on Earth — a land of staggering scale and endless wonder. From the windswept shores of Vladivostok to the imperial elegance of St Petersburg, from Kazan's blend of East and West to the raw beauty of Kamchatka's volcanoes, and from the icy Arctic to the sun-drenched coast of Sochi — it is a place where vastness meets variety. Whether you are riding the Trans-Siberian Railway, hiking in the Altai Mountains or sipping tea in a cosy dacha, there is always more to discover.

Russia is also a treasure trove of cultural riches — a living mosaic shaped by centuries of tradition, creativity and reinvention. This is the homeland of literary giants like Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, cinematic visionaries like Tarkovsky and groundbreaking artists such as Kandinsky and Malevich. From classical ballet and Orthodox iconography to contemporary design and street art, our country's artistic legacy continues to inspire and captivate.

With a heroic past, a resilient spirit and a future shaped by scientific innovation, cultural depth and economic ambition, Russia remains a country both steeped in tradition and moving boldly forward.

Happy Russia Day!

🇷🇺 Happy Russia Day!

Russia is so much more than a country! A civilization, spanning 11 time zones. Russia is ❤️

#RussiaDay #Russia1Love #RussiaDay2025