Lavrov calls U.S. "democracy summit" "artificial" with inflated attendance

Photo taken on Oct. 28, 2021 shows the White House in Washington, D.C., the United States. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)

Americans want to have as many "extras" as possible like in a movie, Lavrov said.

MOSCOW, Nov. 1 (Xinhua) -- Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday that the United States is promoting its Summit for Democracy and trying to inflate the number of participants.

By hosting the summit, Washington aims to divide countries into "democracies" and "non-democracies," and then "full" and "conditional" democracies, Lavrov said in an interview with the Russia 24 TV channel.

This is because Americans want to have as many "extras" as possible like in a movie to create a vision that the United States-headed movement for democracy is popular, he said.

Some of Russia's strategic partners and allies were invited, he said, expressing hope that they will "demonstrate their commitment to existing formats rather than some artificial, one-time and unofficial summits."

U.S. President Joe Biden will host a virtual summit on Dec. 9-10 that will "focus on challenges and opportunities facing democracies."