SOCHI, December 3. /TASS/. The Kremlin is keeping a close eye on developments in NATO but considers the events to be the alliance’s internal affairs, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.
"This is none of our business," the Kremlin spokesman said, responding to a question about internal contradictions in NATO.
"It is our business when the alliance threatens the security of the Russian Federation," Peskov stressed.
As the Kremlin spokesman said, "this alliance is the product of the Cold War era." "The Russian Federation never wanted this epoch to make a comeback but the alliance, which was birthed based on the ideology of confrontation cannot, of course, offer anything else, conceptually," the Kremlin spokesman pointed out.
"In this regard, we, of course, are attentively following the processes inside the alliance and, as far as the dying away or not of any body parts are concerned, well, this is not our business," Peskov said. The Kremlin hinted at a recent statement by French President Emmanuel Macron that NATO was "brain dead" due to the absence of coordination between the United States and its European allies.
US President Donald Trump who arrived at the NATO summit in London said that Macron’s statement was insulting for many of the alliance’s member states and had nothing to do with reality.
The summit of the heads of state and governments from the NATO member countries to mark the alliance’s 70th anniversary is opening in London on Tuesday. NATO’s birthday dates back to April 4, 1949 when the founding Washington Treaty was signed.
The current summit was expected to demonstrate the unity of the allied states before upcoming challenges and express support for the United Kingdom, which is exiting the European Union.
The summit is going to focus on the breakdown of NATO’s expenditures and security provisions in Europe, in particular, after the dismantling of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, as result of Washington’s unilateral exit, for which the alliance accuses Russia.