MOSCOW, December 17. /TASS/. Steps towards further militarisation of south-eastern Europe, including missile defense deployment in Romania, run counter to the interests of regional and European security and stability, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said on Wednesday.

He commented on statements by Chairman of the US House Intelligence Committee Mike Rogers on the “great shield” in Deveselu, Romania.

Rogers told Romanian Realitatea TV Channel that the interceptor missiles the USA is planning to deploy at the American airbase in Deveselu by the end of 2015 are among other things targeting potential threats from Russia.

“Thus, the American legislator confirmed the validity of Moscow’s doubts that the ‘missile defense shield’ being created by the US is designed to be used for the purposes that Washington declared,” Lukashevich said.

“The role assigned to Romania to service the regular American project is hardly as honourable as it is presented,” he said.

“Bucharest’s involvement in another American project that was confirmed in the US Senate recent report on tortures in secret CIA prisons in other countries has put Romanian officials, who were forced to decline journalists’ questions, in a rather awkward position,” Lukashevich said.