Diplomat blames NATO for turning relations with Russia into confrontation

VIENNA, June 28. /TASS/. NATO is openly converting interaction with Russia into the logic of confrontation, Deputy Foreign Minister Aleksey Meshkov told the OSCE Annual Security Review Conference on Tuesday.

"The current state of affairs is dismaying," he said. "Ever more obvious is the high price of the lack of a stable and effective edifice of security that should have united the countries of Euro-Atlantic and Eurasia on the principle of indivisible security. NATO is openly converting interaction with Russia into the logic of confrontation. There is no other way of interpreting the alliance’s policy of building up the military potential on the eastern flank and the official policy of containing Russia."

"This is a direct encroachment against the basics of security in Europe," Meshkov said. "Central and Eastern Europe sees unprecedented militarization. Nearly all NATO countries have set course towards building up military spending. The alliance is holding unreasonably large military exercises."

In this connection Meshkov said that in June alone the Anaconda-2016 exercise - the largest since 1989 and held simultaneously with a naval exercise off Russia’s borders - involved 50,000 troops of NATO countries and partner states.

"We hear NATO leadership talk all the time about plans for ‘continued military presence’," he said. "Military infrastructures are developing actively, fast reaction forces and forward coordination centers and warehouses are being deployed."

"US plans for deploying a US missile defense in Europe makes the strategic situation in Europe still worse," Meshkov said. "It is noteworthy that Washington is not going to revise its missile defense plans even despite progress at the talks on the Iranian nuclear problem.".