NEW DELHI, April 28. /TASS/. Attempts by the United States and its allies to preserve their global dominance have eroded the global security architecture, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said on Friday.

"By seeking to preserve their global dominance, the US and its allies have seriously eroded the global security architecture. They initiated the breakdown and dismantling of key agreements on arms control and confidence-building," Shoigu noted at a meeting of the defense ministers of Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member states in New Delhi.

He pointed out that, first, Washington had unilaterally terminated the Soviet-US Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, refused to ratify the Adapted Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty, and then pulled out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the Open Skies Treaty. According to Shoigu, the meeting with his SCO counterparts "is being held amid a very unstable international situation." "Radical, rapid and irreversible changes are taking place as a new multipolar world order is emerging. The collective West is actively trying to hinder this process," the Russian defense chief maintained.

Shoigu expressed his conviction that the US and its allies are actively seeking to reshape the system of international relations by creating regional alliances that are under their thumb.

According to him, "as a result, security mechanisms and cooperation platforms that took decades to build are being tested for their durability, long-frozen conflicts between countries are being [revived and] escalated, and the likelihood is growing that local crises may morph into large-scale conflicts.".