Photo Credit: U.S. Embassy France
Secretary of State John Kerry with Baroness Catherine Ashton, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy for the European Union.

“We brought him here because we knew that it was inappropriate for us to have discussions with Minister Lavrov, whom I knew I had a meeting with, without being able to consult with our Ukrainian friends. And it would have been inappropriate for us to come here to Paris and for a group of nations to join together and make some kind of an agreement without the appropriate consultation and engagement and involvement and signoff from the people who are concerned. This is a Ukrainian decision, and we respect that.”

So, what does Kerry call it when the governments of the U.S. and Europe are negotiating with Iran without Israel present? Why is that appropriate?

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Then a French reporter noted that the EU is not particularly happy about the U.S. threatening economic penalties against Russia for the Crimean invasion. Europe needs natural gas and other natural resources from Russia, and those needs trump freedom.

“Well, the decisions for the Europeans are decisions for the Europeans,” Kerry answered.

Margaret Brennan from CBS asked if the U.S. threats of economic sanctions have not been weakened by “European reluctance.”

“I don’t think it’s been weakened at all,” Kerry insisted. “The conversations I had today with the foreign minister of Germany, the foreign minister of France, the foreign minister of Great Britain, with the EU representative, and with a number of other foreign ministers, indicated to me that people are very serious about that. There’s been no movement away from the possibility.”

Kerry said the West has made clear its “determination to stand up for the integrity and the sovereignty of this nation, our disagreement with the choice that Russia has made, and our hope that we can find a way forward that respects the rights and aspirations of the people of Ukraine writ large – east, west, south, all of Ukraine… And we’ve made it clear that the decision to go into Crimea is not without cost. And now we need to go forward and see if we can avoid everybody being put in a corner where it’s more and more difficult to find a path that presents you with the solution of dialogue.”

I’ll bet Kerry would have liked to find a way to force both Deshchytsia and Lavrov into a room together, and then someone will turn on the lights and they’ll see Tzipi Livni.

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Yori Yanover has been a working journalist since age 17, before he enlisted and worked for Ba'Machane Nachal. Since then he has worked for Israel Shelanu, the US supplement of Yedioth, JCN18.com, USAJewish.com, Lubavitch News Service, Arutz 7 (as DJ on the high seas), and the Grand Street News. He has published Dancing and Crying, a colorful and intimate portrait of the last two years in the life of the late Lubavitch Rebbe, (in Hebrew), and two fun books in English: The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption, and How Would God REALLY Vote.