MOSCOW, July 25 (Itar-Tass) - Russia and NATO must find solutions to the problems, including missile defense, that divide them at the moment, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov said at a session of the Russia-NATO Council held in Brussels on Wednesday.
“Over the recent time we have been witnessing serious changes in the security sphere. Many regional upheavals make us think about joint moves to strengthen indivisible security,” said Antonov, who led the Russian military delegation. “The threat of international terrorism is not getting weaker. It will take time to assess the aftermath of the ‘Arab spring’ for regional and global security. The situation in Afghanistan, Syria, on the Korean peninsula needs our constant increased attention,” he stressed.
Within this context joint efforts and initiatives toward a common space of peace, security and stability in the Euro-Atlantic region are needed. “Otherwise we will not be able to implement the decisions of the Russia-NATO Council in Lisbon,” he is confident.
“Retaining ‘Cold War’ phantoms creates additional difficulties on the way to form indivisible security for all states in the Euro-Atlantic space,” the deputy minister added. “We are simply bound to find solutions to the problems that are dividing us,” he said, citing among them “the implementation of a controversial European anti-missile shield, attempts to revive the old Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty, an advance of NATO military infrastructure to Russian borders, attempts of the Alliance to increase the number of its participants, the use of military force in bypassing international law.
He reminded the audience that much has been done over the recent years to strengthen trust and develop transparency in the military sphere between NATO countries and Russia. “We are persistently building up cooperation in those spheres where our interests coincide, trying to narrow the spheres of differences, trying to find common projects from which our countries would benefit. The main thing is to put the concept of common security in practice, with concrete deeds, which, in its turn, will help to strengthen trust on the European continent,” Antonov summed up.