Russian Envoy Wants USA To Give Legal Guarantees On Missile Defence
Brussels, 6 May: A missile defence system in Europe should be created on the basis of equal security for all its members, head of the interdepartmental working group in the Russian president's administration for cooperation with NATO on missile defence and Russia's permanent envoy to the alliance Dmitriy Rogozin has said.
On Thursday evening (5 May) at the NATO headquarters, US Missile Defense Agency Director Patrick O'Reilly and Anatoliy Antonov, member of the interdepartmental working group on missile defence and Russian deputy defence minister, held briefings at a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council (NRC) on the ambassadorial level, thus bringing to an end the US-Russian military consultations which began on 2 May.
"Gen Patrick O'Reilly once again tried to convince our side that the USA's antimissile potential in Europe would not create problems for Russia's strategic deterrent. However, we saw once again, also thanks to Gen O'Reilly, that the USA intends, as the treaty with Romania shows, without waiting for the end of talks with Russia, to deploy its system de facto, despite the fact that the range of US missiles exceeds 1,000 km, and the lethal area covers ??the Russian Federation up to the Urals," Dmitriy Rogozin said a news conference following the NRC meeting.
According to him, while neutralizing growing risks of missile attacks, the system which is being constructed "should not create new risks in the process of its development and formation".
If NATO had been dealing only with its own security and strengthening the security of its allies, Russia would have put up no logical objections, Rogozin said.
"But the problem is that, by refusing to accept any kind of limitations on the system under construction, the USA and its NATO allies are trying to outsource someone else's security. They begin to impose their services on those who do not need them, in particular, the Russian Federation," the Russian envoy said.
According to him, Russia has vast experience in this matter. It independently develops its own means of air and space defence and has asked nobody to ensure its security.
Euro-ABM, if it is destined to be, "must follow the principles of indivisibility of security and should not create problems for partners in the process of its development, with the understanding that NATO must defend its territories, and Russia can defend its own territory".
"With regard to our approach, we insist that the idea of the so-called sectoral approach put forward by President Dmitriy Medvedev at the NRC summit in Lisbon is the only possible way to form such a system," the head of the Russian mission to NATO said.
Rogozin also said that Russia "is not closed to opposing ideas and dialectic development of approaches".
"Nevertheless, we believe that it is possible and necessary to create joint missile defence elements, especially in the framework of cooperation of information systems, with the understanding that the firepower of the US missile defence system should be moved away from our territory, our borders, at a distance equal to their range," the diplomat said.
He also said that at the meeting of the NATO-Russia Council a document had been circulated entitled "The political principles and objectives of Russia-NATO cooperation in missile defence".
According to Rogozin, the document "spells out the basis of our possible compromise and the principles on which this system should be built".
He said he hoped that the document would be considered in the next few days, and if it is approved by NATO partners, it could form the basis of the decision which will be discussed by defence ministers at the NATO-Russia Council in Brussels on 9 June.
(On the level of political contacts with the USA and NATO, Russia insists on legal guarantees that the missile defence system which the USA and NATO are building is not directed against Russia's national interests, Rogozin said, as quoted by Interfax news agency.
"As for issues relating to legal guarantees, this will be discussed, I think, on the highest level (Russia-USA - Interfax) at a meeting in Deauville at the end of May," Rogozin said, replying to a question by Interfax.
Rogozin said that "the military can not discuss political or legal guarantees". Their job is to deal with "a concrete combination of security zones, sectors of responsibility and determination of the final configuration".
According to Rogozin, now the diplomats' task is to reach mutual understanding before the meeting of the Russian and US presidents which will be held on the fringes of the G8 meeting in Deauville (France) on 26-27 May and offer "compromise exits from the situation".
He said that the military consultations had been completed at this stage, and political consultations began with a meeting between Russain Deputy Foreign Minister and a member of the interdepartmental working group on missile defence Sergey Ryabkov and Under Secretary of State Ellen Tauscher in Brussels on Thursday evening (5 May).
The Russian side insists that the issue of guarantees should be resolved "by a mutually legally binding document which will not depend on who will become president in the Kremlin or the White House". The form of this document can be discussed, Rogozin said. "The main thing for us is to get sound guarantees which can not be easily or unilaterally revised," Rogozin said.
There is some risk in creating separate missile defence elements in Europe before the overall architecture and common understanding of European security has emerged, Rogozin said, commenting on the USA's and Romania's agreement to deploy US missile defence infrastructure not far from Bucharest.
"Building elements of the US missile defence system in Romania de facto before we have agreed on the configuration of missile defence in Europe is not helpful for future results. You can not build a barn first and then plan a Palace of Congresses on its site," Rogozin said.
He said that "somebody believes that it's quite all right to hold talks with Russia and fill voids and kill time by all sorts of discussions with confusing outcomes, and, meanwhile, the caravan goes on, and, in fact, elements of US missile defence are being deployed in Europe".
"Things like this happened in the past and ended in a fiasco. I am talking about former US President George W. Bush and the US third positional area, when, behind NATO's back, agreements were reached with Poland and the Czech Republic to deploy an X-band radar in the Czech Republic, and strategic missile interceptors in Poland," Rogozin said.
According to him, "this violated NATO's logic, which suffered as a result of exclusive bilateral relations between the USA and some Eastern European countries, but in the end nothing came out of it, including for Poland or the Czech Republic".)
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