Russian Foreign Ministry resented censorship of Lavrov's article

Moscow, July 19 (UNI) The Russian Foreign Ministry today said it withdrew an article by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to be published in the US magazine Foreign Affairs, claiming it had been heavily censored.

"The editors, citing internal requirements, strongly edited, if not censored, the article," the Ministry said in a statement.

The article was handed over to the Foreign Affairs editorial board in May 2007 as Lavrov's "direct address to the readers of this reputable publication as clarification of Russian foreign policy," it said.

"But some of the edits made would have made Lavrov sign his approval of the US administration's well-known foreign policy approaches, which we reject as going against our principles," it noted.

It pointed out the editors insisted that the headline "Deterring Russia: Back to the Future?" be supplemented with a sub-headline that would speak about the prevention "of a new Cold War or a conflict between Russia and the United States." "The thing is, however, that the sub-headline goes radically against the key concept of the Russian Foreign Minister's article," the Ministry said, adding "Moscow is guided by the assumption that there cannot be any talk about a new Cold War, to say nothing of a conflict, between our two countries." "Following tiring and tough talks with the editors, matching samples that can only be traced back in the history of diplomacy, the decision was made not to publish Lavrov's article in the Foreign Affairs magazine," it said, stressing "This experience was reminiscent of the worst periods of the Soviet censorship in the past, which some seem to be trying to revive in the US." UNI XC RS MIR KP1750