PARIS, France: French public television came under severe criticism on Friday for airing a prime-time interview with Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
The France 2 television channel aired 10 minutes of the pre-recorded interview during its Thursday evening news, while the full hour-long version was posted online.
More than four years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Lavrov on France 2 claimed Moscow was intent on defending “international law.”
He said the US-Israeli strikes on Iran that sparked the Middle East war had breached these rules.
But he rejected any notion of Russia breaking international law in Ukraine, claiming its forces never targeted “exclusively civilian” targets.
Ukraine’s ambassador to France, Vadym Omelchenko, said on X that people must be wondering why French television had given a platform to “a war criminal.”
Researcher Etienne Marcuz described the conversation with Lavrov as a “disgraceful interview during which a minister from an opposing power” had been allowed to reel off his talking points.
Russia specialist Dimitri Minic described the interview as “catastrophic.”
“In case France TV teams still underestimate information warfare, they should understand that Moscow has made it the central weapon of its war against the West,” he wrote on X.
France TV did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment.
France’s Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said he regretted that Lavrov had been “able to calmly roll out his propaganda.”
“No, Russia is not defending international law — not in Iran, nor in Ukraine, nor anywhere else,” he responded on the sidelines of a G7 meeting.
“No, Russia does not spare civilians,” he added, mentioning among other examples the 2022 killing of non-combatants in Ukraine’s Bucha and the flattening that year of the besieged city of Mariupol.
During the interview, presenter Lea Salame had responded that France 2 reporters had documented civilian deaths in Ukraine.
US-led Ukraine peace talks to end Europe’s worst conflict since World War II have been derailed by the Middle East conflict.
