Lavrov believes NATO buildup destabilizes Europe – TASS

Alexander Shcherbak/TASS

MOSCOW, June 5. /TASS/. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said that he will discuss with his Belarussian counterpart Vladimir Makey coordinated action in relations with NATO in the wake of the latest decisions taken at the alliances summit.

"We are going to discuss with NATO coordinated action in relations with the North Atlantic Alliance," he said. "In the wake of the latest NATO summits we have to state that the attempts being made to change the existing balance of force in Europe, the alliances military buildup, which is unprecedented since the end of the Cold War, and the growing scale of military training activity, just as the continuing efforts to build a US missile defense destabilize the situation in Europe."

Lavrov said such policies "contradict decisions adopted by the OSCE and Russia-NATO summits on creating an integral space of peace, security and stability in the Euroatlantic region and directly affect the national interests of Russia and Belarus. "Concerted action by our countries, including those within the CSTO, where Belarus holds the rotating presidency this year, acquires special importance," he stated.

Vladimir Makei said the deployment of missile defense elements in Europe and the reinforcement of the NATO eastern flank are undermining the strategic balance of forces in this region.

"The deployment of missile defense elements in Europe and the reinforcement of NATOs eastern flank are becoming the factors that provoke the disruption of the strategic balance of forces and, largely speaking, a new arms race," the minister said.

The argumentation of such actions is well-known and the alliance polishes it fromsummitto summit, he said. "But this does not make it look any more convincing,"Makeisaid. "Mildly speaking, NATO does not want to see an equitable partner in Russia today," the Belarusian foreign minister said.

"This sharply narrows variants for cooperation and leads to the persistence of the high level of tension in the region," he said.

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Lavrov believes NATO buildup destabilizes Europe - TASS