Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Sunday that Ukraine's "hysterical" desire to take militants out of Mariupol's Azovstal plant is related to the fact that these militants can confirm the presence of active officers, as well as mercenaries, from Western armies.

"The situation with the confrontation at the Azovstal plant in Mariupol and the persistent, even hysterical desire of Zelenskyy, his team and his Western patrons to achieve the withdrawal of all these people and send them to the territory of Ukraine is due to the fact that there are many characters who will confirm the presence of mercenaries, maybe acting officers of Western armies on the side of Ukrainian radicals," Lavrov told Italian broadcaster Mediaset.

Moreover, Lavrov said that Washington is no longer comfortable with NATO as it once was amid the situation in Ukraine because the alliance is seeking to reach a consensus on the war.

Lavrov also said that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky can bring about peace in this conflict by forcing the Azov battalion to stop the military activity and release all civilians in their hold.

"Now Zelenskyy can also bring peace if he stops giving criminal orders to his neo-Nazi battalions, forces them to release all civilians and stop resistance," the Foreign Minister said.