NATO has malicious plans against Russia - Lavrov
Provocative actions of NATO like large-scale exercises near Russian borders lead to further confrontation and indicate that the West has aggressive plans towards the Russian Federation.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated this during a press conference, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“Military exercises, which have now sharply increased in quantity, quality, saturation of heavy equipment, the number of countries that participate in them, and geographical proximity close to our borders - this does not at all contribute to normal conversations and coordination of efforts to resolve issues common to all problems.
For more than one year now, we have been proposing that the North Atlantic Alliance agree on specific de-escalation measures,” Lavrov said.
Among these measures, he named an agreement on the distance closer than which Russian and NATO aircraft and sea vessels will not approach each other, as well as agreement on the distance at which NATO and Russian exercises will be withdrawn from the contact line in Donbass.
The minister also said that Russia is ready to discuss controversial and problematic issues with NATO, but the West in response only violates previously reached agreements.
“Our initiatives are on the table. If someone sees any far-reaching, dangerous plans in the Russian Federation’s position, then we are ready to discuss these plans. But NATO is not ready for this.
And when we are called to resume the activities of the Russia-NATO Council, yes, we are ready. But let, first of all, the military begin to talk about what the real situation on Earth is now. Including taking into account the flagrant violation by our NATO colleagues of the agreements concluded in the late nineties that NATO would not deploy significant military forces on the territory of new members. All this has long been forgotten and violated - both the Baltic states and Norway are permanently stationed with the armed forces of the North Atlantic Alliance...
The conclusion is very simple - it means that they have some malicious plans against the Russian Federation. I want to be wrong, but in order to check how sincere the Westerners are in their readiness to improve relations with the Russian Federation, concrete actions are needed. There are concrete proposals on the table, but we haven’t seen any concrete answers yet,” the diplomat added.
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