MOSCOW, May 15. /TASS/. The United States sought to squeeze Russia out from the post-Soviet space and hence prevented its NATO allies from ratifying an updated CFE Treaty, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said.

Commenting on why NATO did not ratify an updated CFE Treaty back in 1999, the senior Russian diplomat told Parlamentskaya Gazeta that the ratification would have ruined Washington’s plans. "They primarily sought to squeeze Russia out from the post-Soviet space. Having realized that they would fail to do so, they actually overthrew the adapted CFE Treaty," he explained.

According to the diplomat, the document was not approved under a formal pretext, although the Russian Federation had fulfilled the necessary conditions. "The formal pretext was to demand that Russia fulfill its 'Istanbul obligations' first. We fulfilled those of their provisions that covered conventional armed forces, but the Americans kept 'moving the goal post' further away. And at a certain point, we realized that the flood of demands was endless," Ryabkov concluded.