CARACAS (Dispatches) --
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called for independent countries to “join forces” against the “blackmail” of Western sanctions, as the longtime diplomat continued his tour of Latin America.
Discussing the war in Ukraine with Venezuelan counterpart Yvan Gil here, Lavrov referred to allies Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua as countries “that choose their own path.”
All are, like Russia, the subject of damaging economic sanctions, he said.
“It is necessary to join forces to counter the attempts of blackmail and illegal unilateral pressure of the West,” Lavrov said at a joint press conference with Gil.
Russia’s top diplomat is on a week-long Latin American tour that started in Brazil and will also take him to Nicaragua and Cuba -- where the leftist governments have hostile relations with the United States.
The White House on Monday -- the same day that President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva met with Lavrov in Brasilia -- criticized the Brazilian leader for saying that Washington was “encouraging the war” in Ukraine and that Kyiv shared blame for the conflict.
Lavrov also met with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who afterward tweeted that it was a “pleasant meeting that strengthened bilateral relations.”
At the bilateral level, Russia and Venezuela announced that they have signed agreements regarding oil and mining.
Lavrov later traveled to Cuba whose President Miguel Diaz-Canel visited Russia at the end of November, where he announced he had signed several agreements concerning oil supplies to the island.
Lavrov is expected to make a final stop in Managua, where he will meet with Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega.
Russia and Venezuela reviewed some of their hundreds of bilateral agreements covering the financial,