The tragedy of Ukraine is the result of the connivance of Western patrons to the criminal regime formed in Kyiv, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday, speaking at a conference on disarmament in the format of a video message, TASS reports.

"The tragedy of Ukraine is the result of the connivance of Western patrons to the criminal regime that was formed there after the bloody anti-constitutional coup in February 2014, carried out contrary to the guarantees of Germany, Poland and France under an agreement on the settlement of the intra-Ukrainian crisis," Lavrov said.

Achieving legally binding security guarantees from NATO countries is of fundamental importance for the Russian Federation, the Foreign Minister said.

“Western colleagues have not yet demonstrated their readiness to provide legally binding long-term security guarantees to Russia.

For us, achieving these goals is of fundamental importance. It is unacceptable for the Russian Federation that American nuclear weapons are located on the territory of a number of European countries, it is high time to return them to the United States.

EU countries are trying to get away from an honest dialogue face to face, choosing the path of sanctions. The Russian Federation hopes that the conference on the NPT will still take place. The Russian Federation is deeply concerned about the situation in the OPCW that has become a consequence of Western policy,” Lavrov noted.