Deputy Minister of Defence of the Russian Federation Colonel-General Alexander Fomin at a meeting of the Russia –NATO Council brought Russian assessments of the current state in the field of euro-security

12.01.2022 (19:30)

On January 12, a meeting of the Russia-NATO Council was held in Brussels (Kingdom of Belgium), during which the Deputy Minister of Defence of the Russian Federation, Colonel-General Alexander Fomin, brought Russian assessments of the current state in the field of euro-security, and also gave explanations on the military aspects of the Russian draft agreement on security guarantees.

Alexander Fomin stressed that "Russian-NATO relations are at a critically low level. This is happening against the backdrop of global instability, the terrorist threat, the deployment of another arms race, as well as the complete degradation of the security architecture in Europe."

He also noted that "in the current legal documents regulating relations between Russia and NATO, there is a commitment to cooperation as partners, without creating threats to each other's security."

It was stated that "the Russian side has repeatedly proposed to the alliance to take measures to de-escalate the situation. On the part of the alliance, Russian initiatives were ignored. This creates prerequisites for incidents and conflicts, undermines the foundations of security.

In these circumstances, the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin decided to send the United States of America and NATO draft agreements on legally binding security guarantees.

The key issues that we consider it necessary to focus on are:

• firstly, guarantees of non-expansion of NATO to the east at the expense of Ukraine and other countries;
• secondly, the obligation not to deploy new American medium-range and shorter-range missiles in Europe, since the deployment of such weapons can dramatically worsen security conditions on the continent;
• thirdly, the restriction of military activity in Europe, the exclusion of the build-up of so-called "forward-based contingents".

All proposals have been brought to the Russia-NATO Council and are on the negotiation table.

It was noted that "the Russian side expects constructive discussion in order to reach the preparation of agreements on security guarantees for the Russian Federation as soon as possible."

Tags: