Full interview: Russian ambassador says New Zealanders are being fed Ukraine ‘propaganda’

Tuesday, 9 June 2026

The new Russian ambassador to New Zealand, Stanislav Krans, sat down with The Post.

**Stanislav Krans says he wants to rebuild people-to-people ties between Russia and New Zealand, saying relations have reached a “historical low”. But he rejected New Zealand’s framing of the war. He spoke to *The Post’s Amelia Wade for an exclusive interview.***

Q: What is your main mission in New Zealand?

A: My main mission is to promote our bilateral relations.

Of course, we have some problems with G2G - government-to-government relations - but it seems to me it is more important to focus on people-to-people exchanges.

If we are talking about the current situation in our relations, we have reached a historical low. But who suffers? Ordinary people because they don’t have a chance to do some business with each other.

We had very good trade before. In 2019, we reached almost half a billion US dollars in trade per year, which is a big amount of money.

How we can help people who have suffered losses because of this situation - they lost their income, they lost their profit, for example, New Zealanders who produce milk, meat or wine. Many Russians like wine made in New Zealand because it is very tasty, very good and very high quality.

Q: But isn’t that the point of sanctions, to put pressure on Russia over the invasion of Ukraine?

A: Sanctions are some kind of instrument that sometimes work in a different way than the people who impose them would like to have. These sanctions mostly harm ordinary people.

The Post’s Amelia Wade interviews Russian ambassador to New Zealand, Stanislav Krans.

It is not a big problem for the Russian economy. If we do not buy something from New Zealand, we will buy it from another country that is ready to sell it to us.

We do not recognise unilateral sanctions. There are sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council, and of course we are obliged to abide by these sanctions.

But we do not recognise your autonomous sanctions, we do not impose any such kind of sanctions. We have travel bans.

Q: Your predecessor did not give interviews. You are here, offering interviews and writing an opinion piece. Is the purpose of this exercise to change the opinions of everyday New Zealanders and then force the Government’s hand to ease pressure on Russia?

A: That is not exactly my main point. Russia is a large country and one of the main players in international affairs. It is not a big deal for Russia to have relations with governments that do not want good relations with us.

We call it mirror diplomacy. That means if someone does not like us, we will respond the same way.

If any government is ready to talk with us, ready to trade with us - we will do it in the same way.

My point is not to push the New Zealand Government. We consider your ministers and leadership to be very smart people, and of course they will make their own decisions by themselves.

We would like them to reconsider their position regarding Russia, but that is not the main point.

We would like to bring more understanding that Russia is only about the current situation in, as we call it, far east Europe. It is a local conflict, and we do not understand why so many countries want to be more involved in a local conflict.

We’re talking about cancel culture that happened in many countries, including, unfortunately, in New Zealand: the cancelling of Russian culture and Russian language.

Q: Hasn’t Russia created that situation for itself by invading Ukraine? New Zealand’s position is unequivocal that the war is illegal, and New Zealand would be obliged to arrest President Putin if he came here. What is the point of all this while the war continues?

A: I used to be a journalist, and I know how propaganda works. Propaganda uses particular wordings, such as “illegal”, “wide-scale” or “unprovoked”. It’s just words, some kind of label that you put on us and what we are doing. After that, you think there is no need to prove it or present evidence that it is the correct wording.

We have a lot of materials, articles and explanations from the last 10 or 12 years explaining the main reasons for the situation we have today: what is going on, why we did what we did, and what happened before that.

Everybody is trying to ignore the circumstances.

Stanislav Krans says Western countries are taking part in ‘cancel culture’ over Russia.

For us, nothing is illegal at this moment. You can count the facts from February 24, 2022, but there is a long history before that. There is a long, long history of rivalry and relations between us and, for example, the US and some European countries,

Ukraine became a proxy between Russia and some Western countries.

Q: In your opinion piece, you wrote: “New Zealanders are not well informed about what Russia and the Russians really are. Centuries-long ‘from ally to foe’ intermittent relationships between Russia and the UK have left their imprint on the mindset of New Zealand, forcing her to follow the British narrative, not her own.”

Are you accusing New Zealanders of following Britain’s narrative when we have our own independent foreign policy?

A: Of course you have your own independent foreign policy.

But because of history, and because of what some other countries do through propaganda. You have a common language with the United Kingdom, and also with the United States. They share labels in articles … you see the same wording every day, almost every hour, it becomes your understanding of the truth.

Because of history … your closer relations with Britain, the United States, Australia and other countries, and because of everyday propaganda, people start to believe it.

For example, if you open a newspaper such as The Post, you will see many articles about Ukraine, but many of them are from AP, The New York Times or other American or European newspapers.

Readers of your newspapers will see this and follow this and understand it. For example, you say it is illegal - you do not need to explain why it is illegal.

Q: New Zealand has come to that decision itself.

A: It is because of the dominance of European and American propaganda here in New Zealand.

Q: Do you accept that it is condescending to suggest New Zealand and New Zealanders cannot make up their own minds on this?

A: No, I am not saying it that way. Of course, it is your absolute right to make your own independent policy.

We are looking for the Government of New Zealand to follow its own foreign policy independently.

When your Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and other ministers say something about foreign policy, we focus on that.

But this is all because of the circumstances. Sometimes when you make your own decisions, you are under the great influence of foreign countries.

Q: It seems the purpose of this charm offensive is to change public opinion in order to change the Government’s position on Russia and ease sanctions.

A: As I said, that is not the main point. My main point is to bring more understanding of what Russian people are, not only Russia as a country or current policy.

We cannot change your point of view. It is already well formed and we have no chance to change it.

Of course we would be glad if the New Zealand Government revises its position on Russia, but my main goal here is to bring more understanding of Russian culture.

For example, this year we celebrate the 100-year anniversary of the famous Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova’s visit. Ballet is very highly appreciated in New Zealand, and Russian ballet is one of the most important parts of our culture.

Q: When I say Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is illegal, are you saying that is propaganda?

A: Correct. I understand why you are asking that. But when you have the chance to meet the new ambassador of one country, you could ask about many issues.

During this interview, you have mainly focused on Ukraine - it’s almost 100% of what you’re asking about. That is your right, but my idea in being here is to bring more narratives about other topics related to Russia, maybe not modern Russia.

During the interview, Krans provided The Post with some souvenirs including a map of Msocow.

Tourism is very important for New Zealand. Many Russians would like to see Wellington, Auckland, Hobbiton and many other places.

If we start to talk about tourism, it will be more comfortable to me that when you talk in New Zealand about Russia, you are not only talking about what you call “the invasion”, but also about other topics.

Educational issues, for example. We have at least eight pairs of universities in our countries that have signed memorandums of cooperation, but because of the current situation this cooperation has stopped. Who suffers? Students and researchers.

Q: The reason I need to challenge you on Ukraine is that, if Russia is allowed to keep territory it seized by force, it sets a precedent that is very worrying for small and medium nations like New Zealand. That is why New Zealand takes such a strong stance.

A: I understand that. When you are talking about who invaded whom, the reason and who is bigger or smaller, you are ignoring the history of the situation.

We can provide many materials. But when we share them openly, people say it is produced by the Russian government and therefore they do not believe it.

The second part is about similar things that you think we are doing, are you also considering the policy of other major powers. For example, did New Zealand impose sanctions against the United States? I think not.

Did you criticise them? Yes, maybe some opposition did. Did you try to force Americans to stop doing things in other parts of the world?

We do not criticise the US. We are not trying to criticise anyone. We do it in a mirror way.

We at least have some dialogue with the United States. It is very important for us to have dialogue. We do not have dialogue with New Zealand, unfortunately. It is not because of us. It's because you’ve frozen the dialogue.

Q: Are you saying New Zealand’s uneven application of sanctions undermines its position on Russia and Ukraine? Are you saying New Zealand has a double standard?

A: Yes. You have double standards.

You are trying to force me to say the word “invasion”. It’s a military conflict that we have.

The reason was the conflict against a huge Russian population living in Ukraine, mostly in the eastern part of Ukraine.

What happened in 2014 was a coup d’état, and it was illegal. But nobody said, “Oh, it was illegal, so the new government in Ukraine came to enforce power illegally, so they started a war against their own population”.

Many Russians remained in Ukraine, especially in Donbas and Crimea. Crimea was previously part of the Russian Republic, not Ukraine. Those people started to fight for their rights.

We have already restarted negotiations, though unfortunately very slowly. We have already made our propositions and Ukraine has shared their own views, and we have begun to exchange positions, thanks to some third-country negotiators who are facilitating the process.

Krans said his main mission was to improve understanding between New Zealand and Russia.

Did you see the recent open letter that President Zelenskyy published — his letter to my president, Mr Vladimir Putin, proposing a face-to-face meeting? The original letter, written in Ukrainian and English, was very, very arrogant.

He would like to send signals to his supporters around the world, including New Zealand. We do not appreciate such an arrogant way of dealing with us. Nobody could.

Q. If, as you say, his approach was arrogant, one could assume it’s because his country has been invaded by yours.

If you would like to talk peacefully, you cannot send arrogant letters.

Q: Russia has banned more than 200 New Zealanders from travelling to Russia, including government ministers, military commanders, regional mayors, the publisher of this company and a number of my colleagues. Russia’s foreign ministry has described them as promoting a Russophobic agenda. What did they actually do to warrant being permanently banned from Russia?

A: As I said, we follow mirror diplomacy. You imposed sanctions. We do not impose that kind of sanction.

Your legislators promptly adopted a new law … the so-called Russia Sanctions Act, in 2022. We don’t have any such kind of Act, we don’t want to impose any unilateral sanctions. A travel ban is the only legal mechanism we have.

You imposed sanctions on our President, our government, all ministers and all MPs … more than 2000. Your sanctions are not only travel bans. They include economic sanctions, banking sanctions, travel sanctions, aircraft, ships and freezing assets.

If you compare that with our travel ban, we did much less than we could have done.

Q: Am I going to get a travel ban because I am asking these questions?

A: No. If everyone who said something against Russia was put under sanctions, half of New Zealand’s media staff would be under sanctions.

Krans says relations are at an historic low.

Many journalists say things we do not agree with about Russia. But only a few media leaders who personally said things we did not consider satisfactory were put on the list … it was a just reaction

Since then, we have not added any of your politicians, journalists or military staff.

Q: Why not lift the ban as an act of good faith?

A: We would like to, but it was a mirror reaction. We cannot do it if you do not start from your side.

You have a huge list of people and entities under sanctions. You can start de-listing one-to-one, and we will do the same.

Q: On the war in Iran, Russia has been accused of supplying intelligence and technology to Iran. Does Russia stand to gain from prolonging the conflict in the Middle East through pressure on fuel prices?

A: First of all, I cannot confirm that we are involved in such a conflict by providing information.

From the point of view of New Zealanders, for example, Western countries, including Israel, provide Ukraine with military force, intelligence and so on. Does that mean they want to prolong the war? I do not think we should talk that way.

Iran is our strategic partner in the region. We have a very long history of relations.

Today we keep in touch with every force in the region. We have very good relations with Arab countries, with Israelis and with Iranians.

We are keeping good relations with all members involved in the conflict in the Middle East.

The Americans are not part of the region, but they are deeply involved and have brought military forces to the region.

This is not good for us because it is our neighbourhood. If you have a conflict on your borders, who would like it? We do not appreciate it.

We do not want conflict on our borders. We are neighbours with Iran and if something happens in Iran, it could affect us.

We are not interested in this conflict.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.