ATHENS, January 30. /TASS/. The Black Sea region should remain a zone of peace and cooperation, as well as the Eastern Mediterranean, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said in an interview with Russian journalists in Athens.

According to the senior diplomat, Russia would not like Greece, a friendly country in relation to it, to be drawn into the geopolitical game associated with containing Russia. "We want both the Black Sea region and the Eastern Mediterranean to remain zones of peace and cooperation, and everything must be done for that. Therefore, this policy of containing Russia has a regional dimension," Grushko said.

"Currently, we can see intensifying attacks on the regional security system in the Black Sea region, NATO’s decisions to increase the number of days spent by groups of warships there, attempts to question the Montreux regime, which has served as a reliable guarantee of military stability and security in that region for decades, plans to equip and re-equip the Navy of Bulgaria, Romania, now they are already talking about Georgia and Ukraine. This is a path that leads to an increase in the potential for confrontation in that region," he said.