Russia slams EU suggestion on India intervening on Ukraine

Russia Friday slammed a reported call of the European Union's envoy to India to "persuade" Russia over the turmoil in eastern Ukraine as "a case of sheer duplicity and sly distortion of the core reasons which led to the intra-Ukrainian conflict".

The Russian embassy in a statement said: "The European Union should retrospect on its own policy of appeasement instead of trying to seek India's services in persuading Russia to do something.

"Such kind of 'persuasion' is alien to Russia-India relations. Our special and privileged strategic partnership has no relation to the West's blunders in their policies towards the Ukraine and Kiev's self-induced crisis.

"We highly value India's balanced and independent approach to this issue," it said.

"The EU should better think how to pay that country's bills for natural gas and bail out its economy from falling into the abyss. And, lastly, a piece of friendly advice - do not try to meddle in Russia-India relations. They are immune to such kind of unsolicited and impolite interventions from outside," it said.

The European Union Wednesday pitched for India's engagement to resolve the Ukraine crisis, saying it can use its privileged relations with Russia to persuade the country to abide by international laws as well as the ceasefire agreement.

European Union Ambassador Joao Cravinho said India can play an important role in finding a peaceful solution to the Ukraine crisis on which Western countries have threatened Russia of more sanctions if it fails to de-escalate the tension.