MOSCOW, February 17. /TASS/. The demand that NATO refrain from further actions damaging Russia’s security remains an imperative as certain arms control measures will otherwise be hardly sustainable, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement posted on its website on Thursday, outlining Russia’s response to the US reply on security guarantees.
The Russian Foreign Ministry pointed out to Washington that Russia "proposed following the path of settling the unacceptable situation, which keeps developing in the Euro-Atlantic region, comprehensively and for the long term."
"This implies, first and foremost, creating a stable foundation of the security architecture in the form of an agreement, under which NATO will give up further actions damaging Russia’s security. This remains an invariable imperative for us. In the absence of such a solid basis, inter-related arms control and military risk reduction measures providing for restraint and predictability of military activity in some areas, even if they are agreed upon, will not be sustainable in the long term," the statement reads.
The Russian Foreign Ministry noted the US readiness to work on particular arms control and risk reduction measures. "We noted that Washington has finally admitted that some Russian proposals and initiatives put forward in these areas in recent years are justified," the statement says.
However, Washington and Brussels gave no constructive response to the most important elements of the Russian initiative, the ministry said.
"The Russian proposals are of a package nature and must be considered comprehensively without singling out some of its components," the Russian Foreign Ministry stressed.
Arms control issues can be examined solely in the context of a comprehensive approach to settling the problem of security guarantees, the ministry pointed out.