NATO must take Russia’s interests into account to resolve Russian-NATO issues – official

MOSCOW. March 7 (Interfax) – Russia is interested in building pragmatic and predictable relations with the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance (NATO) if NATO is ready to take into account Russia’s interests in security and to comply with international law, Russian Permanent Representative to NATO, Alexander Grushko, said.

“These relations can develop in the right direction only if NATO complies with international law. This is the basis, which would allow us to cooperate with the Alliance,” the Russian diplomat said in an interview with Voice of Russia radio station.

Grushko said that the political dialog in the framework of Russia-NATO Council was gaining momentum, however the military factor would always be decisive for the Russian-NATO relations.

“The military and political reality will be determined mainly by the role the Alliance sees for itself in the new security conditions. And Russian-NATO relations will depend a lot on this – whether the Alliance is capable of integrating in collective efforts or it will try to impose a one-sided approach and will act without taking international law into consideration,” Grushko said.

Grushko said that the current situation in Europe was completely different from the one when the continent was divided between opposing millions of NATO and Soviet forces. The diplomat said that he was sure that it was impossible to return to those times.

“We are now living in a different military and political reality. However, we have to be cautious in the military sphere. NATO is the biggest military block in the world. NATO accounts for over a half of military budgets of all countries put together and this reality will remain in the foreseeable future. There are no trifles in military matters. We have to take potentials into account,” the diplomat said.

Russia and NATO still have differing views of the Alliance’s expansion, Grushko said.

“This project (NATO expansion) has completely exhausted itself. It doesn’t solve any real security problems, it just creates additional dividing lines in Europe, unnecessary tension and generates cold war approaches not only in states’ political behavior but in military construction as well. We see that NATO military infrastructure is getting closer to Russia. And we have to consider this factor in our defense planning,” he said.

The chances that Russian and NATO reach an agreement on the air defense shield are currently minimal, Grushko said.

“We have virtually developed opportunities to advance in the work on documents our leaders ordered the Russia-NATO Council to draft in Lisbon. So moving forward isn’t considered without fundamental alterations, without fundamental change in the position of our western partners. The main issue is that Russia has no guarantees, from the United States to start with, that the system being created is not aimed at strategic nuclear means in Russia,” Grushko said.

It is necessary to adopt new approaches in the military sphere, which demand changes in the whole philosophy on common threats, the Russian diplomat said.