MOSCOW, March 29. /TASS/. Moscow hopes that NATO understands the seriousness of the situation around Russia’s plans to deploy its nuclear weapons in Belarus, a senior Russian diplomat told reporters on Wednesday.

"Hopefully, NATO members and, most importantly, those politicians and officials from leading NATO countries who lay claim to global leadership based on their own self-formulated rules and directives will appropriately assess how serious the situation is," said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov.

"We can see that the serious signals we have made and our actions have only been ‘scratching the surface’ in these countries. They have not even left any external imprint on the position of the aforementioned bloc," he lamented. "So, then, one must reckon with the changing reality," he added.

The diplomat explained that the relevant statement made by the Russian president "reflects an entire range of measures that have been and will be taken." "By flouting all of this, the politicians in power, and the Western elites in general, are demonstrating their fundamentally, deeply irresponsible attitude toward their own countries, their own peoples, and toward international security," Ryabkov emphasized.

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on March 25 that, at Minsk’s request, Moscow would deploy its tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, similar to what the United States has been doing for some time on the territories of its allies. Russia has already handed over the nuclear-capable Iskander missile system to Belarus. A storage facility for tactical nuclear weapons should be built by July 1, the Russian leader added.