MOSCOW, April 15. /TASS/. Russia’s foreign ministry is seriously worried over the United States’ plans to deploy new nuclear bombs in Europe, the ministry said in a comment on Friday.

"Of serious concern is the fact that as part of its unprecedented nuclear arsenals modernization program the United States plans to deploy in Europe new lower capacity precision nuclear air bombs," the ministry said. "It is a very dangerous project that can considerably lower the nuclear weapons use ‘threshold’ when American nuclear bombs are seen as ‘battlefield weapons.’ We must not forget that Moscow and Washington abandoned such an option twenty-five years ago. It looks like the United States is planning to plunge back into its former irresponsible practice of walking on the brink of nuclear warfare."

"Washington’s approach to the observance of the provisions of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons [NPT Treaty] is still alarming," the ministry said. "The United States along with its non-nuclear NATO allies continue exercises to drill nuclear weapons usage skills as part of the so-called ‘nuclear sharing.’ It is a flagrant violation of Articles I and II of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons."

"Instead of propaganda statements on the United States’ commitment to further steps in the area of nuclear disarmament, it would be expedient to pull all US non-strategic nuclear weapons back to the national territory [as Russia did twenty-five year ago], to impose a ban on their deployment outside national territories, to dismantle the entire infrastructure that can be used to swiftly re-deploy US nuclear weapons in Europe and, of course, to refrain from any exercises with servicemen of non-nuclear NATO states on drilling the skills of the use of nuclear weapons," the ministry stressed.

Pentagon’s microbiological activities alarm world community

Pentagon’s dangerous microbiological activities are a source of particular concern for the world community, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement released on Friday.

Facilities of military biological infrastructure of the US Department of Defense have appeared in many countries. More and more of them have been approaching the Russian borders in recent years, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

"It is clear that the activities of these microbiologists and doctors in uniform, who deal with infectants of dangerous diseases, have little to do with humanitarian goals. One can only guess about the real content of this research, which is strictly confidential," the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

No sense in returning to Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty

There is no point in returning to the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty) as the United States and other NATO countries have made inviable, the Russian foreign ministry said.

"It was the United States and its NATO allies who have created such circumstances that sapped the viability of the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe and made it inevitable for Russia to suspend it in 2007," the ministry said. "Since then, the erosion and devaluation of the regime of control over conventional arms in Europe have only intensified."

"Moreover, the United States and NATO have embarked on a course of ‘containing’ Russia and tilting the balance of forces in the European continent in their favor by means of the Alliance’s expansion, moving its military infrastructure eastwards and now by means of deployment of their forces in direct proximity to the Russian borders," the ministry said.

Moscow, according to the Russian foreign ministry, is confident that "prospects for the development of a new regime of control over conventional arms in Europe on the principles of equal and indivisible security, balanced nature of the rights and liabilities of the parties are to be considered in the context of NATO’s rejection of policy of enhancing measures of military ‘containment’ of Russia, resumption of a due level of trust and normalization of relations with Russia, including in the sphere of military cooperation."