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Russia and the West seriously differed over the approach to the Syrian conflict, but the international community's ultimate aim was the same, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Thursday.
"We actually differ rather seriously over the ways to reach the objectives (in Syria)," Lavrov told Russia-24 TV Channel, commenting on the results of the Group of Eight (G8) Summit.
He said neither Russia, nor the West, nor other "normal states", including Arab countries, wanted Syria to follow to follow the Iraq model of U.S. intervention and occupation of that country.
"There is common understanding on Syria that the country must be preserved integrated, sovereign, multiethnic, multiconfessional, where all minorities would have their rights secured," Lavrov said.
After the two-day summit in Lough Erne, Northern Ireland, the G8 leaders have reached consensus over pushing peace talks on Syria and pressing Syria's conflicting sides to join the talks as soon as possible.
Before the G8 announced its consensus, some Western leaders and media heavily campaigned and put pressure on Russia.
On the eve of the summit, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said the G8 actually was a Seven Plus One group, because Russia was the sole country backing president Bashar al-Assad's government.
