ah welcome to worlds apart. teaching russia lesson has never been an easy undertaking for the europeans to centuries ago. napoleon, despite considering russia and natural allies, decided to punish him for rebuking a french embargo and lost much of his army. in that effort. in the 20th century, the germans made their move and meant the same fate. can europe close this historical gestalt, this time around, by joining forces against russia in ukraine? to discuss that now joined by austria's former minister of foreign affairs, karen nestle. madame is great to see you and welcome to russia. thank you very much for the kind of invitation, and it's always a pleasure to be in your country. now, before we delve into history and your politics, i want to ask you about your own post ministerial transition, because i know that you had to leave your native country due to personal and

financial pressures. you 1st went to france and then you eventually settled in lebanon, which is such an reversal of the traditional immigrant. good because we usually think of people moving from the middle is to europe. you made it the other way around. how has been this adventure been for you so far? what i, it's now nearly a year that are after lebanon. it was in spring last year with old events. and when i went, made my 1st administrative steps in may in lebanon, and i said, i need to text number, i need to residency, paper, et cetera. the notary, i went to the lawyers, i went to c. d asked me like, are you crazy? you want to come to let you on your settling and long, 15000 lebanese are leaving for a month lebanon. and i said, yes, it's a y, as it will last problems in europe, and does much more freedom in lebanon than in europe. that's why i'm here. it's interesting you say that because i, i also love liberal. i used to go there when i was reporting on the war in syria

and it was such her respite. and one thing that the suck with me is you describing lebanon a as a place where you found a freedom of mind that this is a very interesting type of freed them. what do you mean by that? well, it's not the freedom that is stipulated in across attrition, in a paper. it's not the oldest freedom commitments that you hear all the time. i in such a european union. no, it's a freedom that is lift in the sense of live and let live, you know, people live next to each other. they don't live with each other. this is also effect on lebanon, was, is 18 different ethnic groups. every traveler station that we have seen throughout the many chapters of protracted war. ah, but there's consensus, does the magnus consanzo isn't as what europe is missing, where we only see black and white now in lebanon? you have grey. this isn't a very interesting question because i think lebanon is a very diverse society. if it's the gay capital of the middle east,

they're very vibrant, ny 5. but during the day, you, you would know that because it looks like a traditional muslim society. and i think it's a different, a more discrete, perhaps way of dealing with diversity where various groups have their spaces. and they also have some sort of a shared a ticket when they can be themselves without being in the other's faces. so it's done more tolerant their thing and more discreetly. how does it feel to you after a living for so many years in europe, which i think has a much more sort of in the face more demonstrative way all for showing your identity, whatever it is, or you know, are the europe that i always was grateful for has ceased to exist. and what, when i mean this, europe, it's a europe where you could do it is live and let live where you could have different opinions. 1520 years ago, it was completely normal that i like home sting people for lunch and dinner. and i

always had a wide spectrum of acquaintances. there were communists. oil is to wear of all kind of ethnic religious backgrounds and you could sit down sheer food, be of very divergent opinions. ah, this agree but meet again. this is not any more possible to day and you're cancelled. and whether you have, whether you're not going along with the majority opinion on a migration policy, like in 2015 when i started to have my skeptical positions on that. and i'm definitely not so far began. definitely not the fascist. i enter summit or whatever . but i was labeled all that because i said back in 2015, it won't work about how people saw it, you know? and so whether it's now on russia, whether it's on climate change, whether it's on your name. if you have the topic, there's only black and white. one thing that i cannot understand is that many europeans pride themselves on being true democrats and they see russia,

for example, as an authoritarian country. but the approach you are describing when everything is very manichean, black or white, either you are with the forces of good. busy with the forces of evil, it's very totalitarian in nature. do you think people understand that? and is it a deliberate policy or a handful understand like 2 days ago, there was a headline in austin, online media counting the format and foreign minister crisis back to the empire of eva. and the interesting thing was that in the chat rooms, a lot of people had some sort of supportive position and saying why we understand why you left europe. and the way you were chased out of our country is, is, is tremendous. and we regretted saw that support from, from, so readers if you want us or a lot of hatred from others coming out. but many people have realized that why are the pandemic wire this one year of war and to anybody who is asking for peace

negotiations is considered a traitor, is considered a negative bedside of the history. it's all about arms shipping. so where has this? europe disappeared? where you had a rational discourse where you had skepticism. i, i said already when i served as a minister that when i want to see a dives, i travel to moscow to new dalio, peachy. why not went west of vienna? i was often confronted with elderly teenagers. are emotional, not any more ational. now this is not just some moral pressure as far as i understand you faced real are obstacles to continue living your life with dignity and ostrich. can you talk more about that? yeah, well i'm in the, in 2022 and a panoramic started. maybe people had not the topic of myself, but i, i, i faced a media campaign against me that was weird. that was completely irrational. i was

inter alia, it was just to give your 11 example accused of having the navi shock formula on my desk when i was minister and which i had been experimenting according to the go with the sorcerer, which i had a photo that has kept, kept up coming again and again was the photo of a dance was so the president of the russian federation. so she had danced with the devil she is cooking poisoned, to kill animals. and i, and i had also that was also been brought up by the media last year only that i am taking out jewelry. it was and it is a witch hunt and it was suppressed, taking that uncertain this. i couldn't press any more because i said to myself, but this is, this is impossible. what is going on there? and d, r and i, a in 2020, i still lived in austria. the tick dicked out a dark that i had taken from there from doc shelter, which had been put to sleep,

but a veterinary and accusing me of having killed the dock and in the middle of them had they meal for the 1st time and legal history of austria, a dog was exhumed, you say in english, and there was an autopsy to prove that you didn't kill it or that. yeah, no, they wanted to prove that i closed magic seriously, but you come from a country that gave the world many world renown psychologist digman phrases yes or one of them, but there are many others. how do you explain this sudden reversal of fortune? because, you know, maybe it's just asked the russians, but we associate europe with enlightenment values with critical thinking with our to appreciation of for our all forms of diversity, not only political but there any other. how do you explain it to yourself? yeah, well this is what i am and i started to ride. i stopped now because i had other things to do. a book which i call a requiem for europe, because the europe you're just described, it's the one i was always grateful for,

not only proud of, but grateful for that. i could grow up in that groups for, now's my opinion, without risking a lot. and even being mistaken, i'm in there and we only learned by mistakes, but i pity the youngsters of today because there's a lot of self censorship on many topics in schools that started just a migration topic to my impression it went on with the climate change. tom, back, it went on his panoramic how you see it. i mean there was no, there was a real debate, it was either. busy or, but never as and, and now it's about russia and it's about, yes, we have to fight russia and russia has to be taken off the map. and at that, how did this, it rushes thinking of the map. i wonder what do you want to do with that huge hold of them in there, but, but there's the continent is all the, what i realized was this irrational anti russian sentiment, especially in austria and germany, which i had underestimated when i lived in france for young sensing it was before

the war, but i, when i said, i'm traveling to moscow next week to teach my landlord neighbors will tell her interesting are for a close story and there's lots of cultural perception of fresh. so the french are much more relaxed when you speak about russia, not the case for drama and austria. now what are you doing? russia, you're, there was the mafia. you are, i mean, russia, this, a rash of phobia is this russia enter russian sentiment has come up again in austria and germany over the last few years. and i was like a collateral damage, you know, many people's personal still want to take to russia. everybody was happy about the rich russian tourist lions and people who made large parts of the economic economy flow because state created accompanies there. but it was also the case that indiana medical doctors would say, we don't treat russians anymore. now are we talked about this use a family of it? let me ask about what many people here in russia describe as russian

a euro centrism. and i've heard many political scientists suggest that over the last couple of centuries, russia has developed not only technological, but a psychological and almost a spiritual dependence on i, europe. we see europe as a, as an epitome of everything. positive progressive as the sort of and reachable even where we won the gold. but just like in the bible, there's always this angel with a fiery song that the gate and we are always being pushed her away from there. do you think or ra europe has ever been? what russia projected it to be here? when we look at the very rough figures of war, us, i would say the wars that we have seen in central and western europe when his, when we think of the wharf. so to years, when you think of other religious was protestant catholics, which was not only about religion, it was a power warf course. the figures are much higher than any kind of civil strife. you

either had on russian territory or in the middle east and, and the did many, many wars that we have seen in, on the european continent. it was always about either or it was always very black and white. and there did order her accomplishments that you have best rift that you're referring to, to europe. i know it from the middle east. i know it from us, from a generation that unfortunate this already disappeared. but when i was in my twenties, these people ran to seventy's and they had gone to cambridge to hide with back to paris, they were half french, half german in the hard. and they, they were in love with syrup and they taught me a lot about european culture with stare passion for classical music of philosophy. which sometimes we the europeans, i would say, under estimated as our cultural legacy. we needed maybe that on a russian emmy grant, or a lebanese, or student would wow,

troy attention to and her there that the europe that you're referring to exist it in between. it was maybe at a court of why marvin sheila and grew to where it is cas seeing and how that was there. i mean that there was this strong competition between so many small courts, maybe the big difference font between the russian history and, and the many european histories you have because there's not one is that, um, especially in the, on the territory of what is today. germany, austria, and other central european countries. it was called a holy roman empire germination, which they factor were hundreds of small quarts. a very small quartz, pardon barden, by mar, tooling an hour. but that also led to competition. and you had to miss an you had counts or dukes who tried to attract the most the brightest minds of those times.

some of them went bankrupt while investing in art or a new castles. but that's also brought competition on the arts level on the university lever to give you an example that was met him vessel. you can give me that example after a short break, but we have to take it right now. we will be back in just a moment. ah ah ah ah ah ah

ah ah ah ah ah ah welcome back to world to part with austria's former minister of foreign affairs karen, can i so let em can i so before i so rudely interrupted you, you were talking about how this positive impression all 5 germany and

the broader europe was actually rooted in reality in the previous centuries. but i think it was also the russian perception of the 20th century, especially associated with the rule of law. because, ah, i was born in the waning years of the soviet union, and i remember, you know, vladimir putin being very young even when he was vice mayor of fi st. petersburg. my hometown, there was a lot of talk about, you know, german law or austrian discipline and the treatment of everybody as equal before. the lord the presumption that a person is innocent until proven guilty. when you look at how you were treated or how some of the russian nationals are now being treated, what do you think happened to that concept? the rattle except that as somebody who's studied law, i'm simply struck i'm, i'm shocked by what's going on. the way law has been twisted

confiscation, cutting of bank accounts, lists have replaced loss. this is to put it in a nutshell to come back to which found which we discussed before. and, ah, let me put it in a little bit of irony. but when you were accused of which craft in 17th century, you can walk to the court, you were tortured, but at least that you were told your crime. you had danced with the devil you had put some children. ah, in my case, i only learnt by sheer coincidence that i am plucked listed, and i don't even know my crimes. but the effect of it is i'm not allowed to open a bank account. i'm not allowed to work. it's a defect to prohibition to work. which i actually the fact of prohibition to leave because it will have sources of income. how can you or you cannot open your bank account, this makes your life impossible. so, so when i compare it to the witch trials, the 17th century, which by the way also happened only in germany, english,

there were some in that in the united states as in the united states. but to my knowledge, not in russia, you have by jago, who is a kind of more most units. she's more the kind which and she is a, she's both black and white. and i think that's actually a distinct feature of the russian culture and the russian collective psychology is that we have seen our shadow. we have incorporated it and we know our own the evil . unlike the europeans who only see their, their shiny side, but seeing the world in that time frame, i had the many destructive consequences as you know, in the 20th century. how is this treatment of you or of russians as bad russians and russians are treated collectively as the, as a bad nation? how is it different from dividing people into uber and inter mentioned yeah, they are. no, this is, this is an old story that unfortunately we have see in pushed to the extreme on the aust fontes on front by the german army and also by the austrians or just when it

came to russians. the way women retreated will it as well? why destroy it? ah, and, and which was left in the collective consciousness older than of the soldiers who came as occupiers liberation, whatever you call them depends on the, on the vantage point. when they arrived in berlin in vienna, in the case of, of, of russia, i would say it's also this old east west dichotomy. and that we can also go back to the ottoman war times. we can go back to the wars between persia and the crick city states. you know, there's the big, far east, the wives of the dark, the also terry and east. it all comes back now. and they stated that the light, why it's a shiny place of, of the west. i since i work a lot in indiana to oil markets. i know the stereotypes when it comes to the air up muslim, shakes, blackmailing to pul, western oil consumer and all, with 1972,

our crisis. it's still a stereotype. are evil russians who are mounting day as a weapon. now is even russia just wanted to, you know, since you mentioned your expertise in the energy field? i'm sure you've heard this recent revelations by seymour hersh, pulitzer prize winner about reportedly the american special services being behind on the explosions on the north stream pipelines. putting aside the morality of this issue, if we believe this a respectable journalist, why do you think that americans even needed to order something like that, or to execute something like that? because the europeans were already pretty disciplined in towing their line? why would they resort to say measures because it's essentially an industrial terrorism, and it's also the shifting of the norms in, in a way. definitely i, i was sure that they would make the utmost that not string to which is only the expansion of an existing pipeline would never go online. that, that,

that was my conviction, but i never expected them to blow it up on this, of course, is, as you said, an act of terrorism as a preach of international relations. so, but they were obsessed with this topic, the really well in my account us and it was old time not string, not stream ah, and a a pure obsession. how to put it. i gave a lot of thoughts to it, but i reside already in 2014 coming, not stream to was not yet on paper, but we had then south stream and also the project to connect to the russian a terminal universalist. was that by darian port? i think of both up and there was a lot of pressure by the us under pin commission. they than sabotaged project. and the russians. i waited for a few months and what will happen and saw stream never materialized. so it was

turned into 2 extreme and that was the time wonder turco russia energy corporation also started very, very solidly and played out in see it. since you mentioned turkey, because turkey has a similar experience, a sort of wanting b to be part of for big. busy europe being pushed away, interfering in the european politics in, in many different ways over centuries, and now also pursuing its own the very interesting game. how do you see these 2 countries play out both among themselves and though with europe given that the europe are so positional toward sir russia right now? do you think are the same treatment will be given to turkey swanson, or later? well, i think for turkey to kias tail, fisher call themselves now ah, has, oh, has done its utmost to be taken serious on an equal lover. and they were you related at various instances and learn who they

are? now of course, i was wondering if, if you crate his admitted into to your opinion in a some claim my to take 5 years at stick or anything go or shorter. i did. it raises a lot of questions, not only in alcohol, also in other cities where, where people have been chewing up and fulfilling requirements. oh, dear that, that the turkish side as think, looks at europe are not on the as an economic partner. there's also historic ties. this buff all southeast europe, the balkans, where the auto months were present at the near altamont policy that has been practiced by the acre b is very much into that and their, their, their present ethical ties. but also let us not forget that as a jester of millions of turks living in such europe, in the netherlands in germany. berlin is to force city of turks. after is temple is

macca. it's berlin, with several 1000000 of turks de rolled. it took years to day when in, in, in the current climate of conflict is the, are the only ones who still practice diplomacy in the general sense of diplomacy. and he wrote about it and your other book about the not the art, but the craft of diplomacy. i like to load because it pays homage to the very complex and painstaking nature of this profession. i takes a lot of knowledge, lot of great. a lot of perseverance, a lot of for hard work and a bid ofa. good luck. do you think me would ever come back to the, to the craft of diplomacy, respecting, diplomacy as a profession? yeah. for that it's, they put, need also new recruitment policy for people who have, who are talented to we have a lot of until the 10th people, unfortunately in, in, in and diplomatic stuff all across the cloak. but we have to more talented one. when it, when you go east,

we have to more professional wants. when you go east of that is the core is plea in that turkish minister of foreign affairs is out there. russia minister of foreign affairs, where there's also does adults mindset that i'm missing and willingness to study your neighbor and then accurately perceiving yourself or how to shine. and so we have seen it's, it stems from the united states. it's prop, very much practiced by your countries. this attitude of transforming the idea of transformative diplomacy. it's a technical term and u. s. foreign policy. look at what's going online, budapest, you half high ranking us officials arriving in budapest and telling them off, you know, what has to happen. terms of media will test to happen in terms of, of, to just, i mean, that's not the way to happen. we're talking on the background though, for a very tragic we're, that's happening in the neighboring country and you have some understanding of both the russian mentality, you know, the russian liter personally. and i think you would agree with him with me rather

than him or whatever it wasn't that was on his mind when he authorized this military operations. wasn't an easy decision for him knowing what he knows what he talks about, the ukraine. what do you see me ah, persuade him to call it quits. what do you think? would there persuade russia to put an end to this fighting? oh, well, it was from the very early days. a proxy void was from the very early day, an awe and antagonism. not only about territory, i'm in territories, ones sing. it's never was a pure to territorial dispute. it was one about the bigger topic of security security guarantees and o as in staff to either ludden psychology, collective consciousness, geography that you have in that area. and they, sir, there's an experience in russia mindset that so there were this invasions,

there was this fragmentation and also to roll off. let's go back to vienna. diplomacy of early 20th century. i always thought that the, the transport of linen from switzerland tor st. petersburg in 1917 was the last minute decision tour to get rid of the eastern front. no, sir, a book by an austrian historian like elizabeth, harish. i learned that actually had been a long, a long reach of far back, reaching into lay 18 ninety's. a development in how to frame man's russia and his support of debauchery movement, which was not him boswell, it was not a majority of representative movement of the russian stan demand from vienna. the money from mister head pont pavel saw organize all that. i was moving into it. it was all about frick mounting. russia and the then minister of foreign affairs of

austria, said before, 1914 i or russia is too big that we can attack it. we'll have to make sure that it somehow implodes from inside. so do you think that there's a little mindset of the current decision makers because they do not make an impression of people who actually study, he know books does. no history does come get a historical approach, but when you hear from think tanks, universities, people, and even there's now a sort of development of, of making you plus the waiting rooms, you know, to european communities. somehow recreated plus in writing may be russian regions, or russian a position as to say, it goes back to it affirms it goes back to frick mounting. while madam and this has been a fascinating conversation, thank you very much for that. i can thank you for watching hope to see her again on worlds apart. ah

with mm ah ah ah ah ah

ah, ah, just this hours headline stories ukrainian friends launch a barrage of some 40 rockets on this city of done yet killing one and injuring 11 according to local officials who reiterate that the area does not have any military facilities away with it was only only one logical suspect to begin with nato and united states because russia would never do that to what's on pipeline. that's veteran journalist jewelry, who interviewed the award winning writer seymour hearse on his nord stream.