MOSCOW. Dec 29 (Interfax) - The German leadership has taken a course toward containing and demonizing Russia, which is deteriorating Russian-German relations, Russian First Deputy Foreign Minister Vladimir Titov told Interfax.
"If we talk about the dynamics of our cooperation with Germany, it's obviously negative nowadays. There are multitudes of reasons for this, the primary one being the foreign political course toward containing our country, which the German government has been purposefully accelerating in the past few years," Titov said.
"Apparently, explanations for this should be looked for in Berlin. Most likely, it's an attempt to establish itself as Europe's leader by exploiting sentiments in a number of other countries toward demonizing Russia and being liked by its allies outside of the EU," he said.
"This is leading to the deterioration of the trusting relationship that has formed for decades," he said.
Asked what role the incident involving opposition activist Alexei Navalny could have played in the decline in the Moscow-Berlin relationship, Titov replied, "The significance of the Navalny incident should not be overestimated in this context. This is just one fragment of a larger picture."